10 posts tagged with "release"

The days are getting longer and solar charging is starting to be fun again. A good time for a short update on the latest developments at evcc.

New Tesla Integration​

In October Tesla introduced a new official API. In addition, they announced that the old, unofficial API will be shut down at the beginning of 2024.

What does this mean for me?​

To use the new API, you need to make two adjustments to the evcc.yaml:

1. New template name: Since the old API still works for some users today, we have decided to offer both implementations in parallel for the time being. Change the template name from tesla to tesla-command to use the new API.

2. Generate new tokens: With the new API it is now possible to generate the required accessToken and refreshToken directly in the browser. For this we have provided a small website at tesla.evcc.io.

The configuration should then look like this:

vehicles:
 - name: mytesla
   type: template
   template: tesla-command # change `tesla` to `tesla-command`
   accessToken: ... # generetad by tesla.evcc.io
   refreshToken:  ... # generetad by tesla.evcc.io
   ...

The tokens generated via tesla.evcc.io can only be used with the official evcc builds (stable & nightly). The reason for this is that the tokens from Tesla's new Developer API are always bound to a 3rd-party app.

You can of course still build evcc yourself. However, you will need your own Tesla Developer Account and have to generate the tokens yourself. More details can be found in the corresponding Pull Request.

Privacy & Security​

As with the old API, the communication for data retrieval (charge level, status, ...) and control (wake up) runs directly between your local evcc instance and the Tesla infrastructure. Only the token generation runs once via our website. Tokens are not stored, but only displayed to you in the browser.

For an extended control of the vehicle (start and stop charging directly at the vehicle) an additional signed request to Tesla is required. Today this affects the users of a Tesla Wall Connector. Since we cannot and may not pack our private 3rd party app key into the evcc binary, we will probably provide our own service for this application, which signs these requests and forwards them to Tesla. But more on that in a later release.

Costs​

Tesla is currently offering the new API free of charge. However, they have already announced that they will charge fees for using the API in the future. Unfortunately, we do not yet know how open source friendly this model will be.

It's quite possible that we won't be able to offer token generation for free in the future. We may link it to the existing evcc sponsorship model. But more on that when there is new information from Tesla.

Active Battery Control​

A big new feature that comes with the Christmas release is the active battery control. This function is no longer marked as experimental. In addition, some new supported battery inverters have been added in recent weeks. In the documentation you can now see if your inverter is supported.

Passive Control​

Passive battery control has been available in evcc for some time now. Here evcc regulates the solar charging so that the house battery is not discharged unintentionally. Last year we introduced a configuration dialog where you can set the priority between vehicle and house battery charging. This model works very well for solar charging. evcc knows the current state of charge of the house battery and only regulates the charging power of the vehicle. However, this mechanism does not work for fast charging. An active battery control is required for this.

Prevent discharge during fast charging​

By default, the house battery tries to cover the entire energy consumption of the house (including charging stations). Depending on the current electricity price or expected PV generation, however, it may be desirable to obtain the energy for fast vehicle charging directly from the grid and not from the house battery. This way the collected solar energy remains in the house battery and can be used for the house consumption at night, for example.

This is our first use case for active battery control. If your inverter supports this feature, a corresponding option will appear in the battery settings dialog.

When this option is active, the house battery is put into a lock mode during fast charging. In this time it is neither discharged nor charged. This lock is also active during scheduled charging and smart grid charging.

Next step: Charging the battery with cheap grid power​

The next stage of development for active battery control is the possibility to charge the house battery with cheap grid power. This is especially interesting for users of dynamic electricity tariffs on darker days. The goal here is to fill the house battery with energy from the grid during low price phases and then use this energy in-house during high price phases. We have already implemented the necessary hardware integrations. Therefore we expect this feature to be available in one of the next releases.

Update: Migration to browser configuration​

evcc is a very flexible and powerful system for your own energy optimization. Our biggest challenge is still to combine this flexibility with an easy setup process. In the last months we have made great progress in the area of configuration. Our goal is to enable a pure browser-based commissioning, without evcc.yaml.

If you have activated the option "Show experimental UI features" in the settings dialog, you can see our current development progress under "🧪 Device Configuration". Currently you can add and edit vehicles, grid meters, PV and battery systems there. Charging stations and tariffs will follow in the next iteration. Even though this is still a "work in progress", we look forward to your feedback.

Small improvements and bug fixes​

As always, this release also contains a number of smaller improvements and bug fixes. For more details, have a look at the Release Notes.

All the best
your evcc core team

Since the last blog post, a lot has happened. We have added many new features and fixed some bugs. In this article we will highlight some of the new features.

Charging planner visualization​

The charging planner has been around for a while at evcc. You specify when your vehicle should have a desired state of charge and evcc finds the best time slots. Since a few releases the algorithm is no longer a black box, as we visualize the planning result.

How does the algorithm work?

5. Surplus solar energy is prioritized
6. Times with cheap grid electricity (if dynamic electricity tariff exists)
7. Times with clean grid electricity (if CO₂ interface is configured)
8. Time windows shortly before departure

Outlook: We are currently experimenting with PV forecast data from Solcast. This allows the algorithm to make even better decisions. For example, if the charging target is during the day, it may make sense not to charge the vehicle completely with cheap night-time electricity, but to leave room for surplus energy during the day.

UI adjustable minimum charge​

The minimum charge function has been around at evcc for ages. It is helpful if you come home with only a few percent and want to make sure you always have enough range for an unexpected event.

Until now, it could only be set via the configuration file or via API. Now you can also do this via the UI under Plan > Arrival > Min. charge %.

The settings are stored per vehicle and are retained even after a restart or update.

Smart grid charging​

When your own PV surplus is not enough, you can also use grid electricity when it is particularly cheap or clean. If you click on the grid electricity price or CO₂ emissions in the energy flow diagram, the Smart Grid Charging dialog opens.

There you can set a threshold for the price or CO₂ emissions. If this value is exceeded, evcc temporarily all PV mode loadpoints to fast charging.

Prerequisite for this function is that you have configured either a dynamic electricity price or a CO₂ integration.

Another small enhancement is that with most dynamic electricity prices you now have the option to correct the price values from the API with percentage or fixed charges (charges / tax). Tibber and Octopus Energy (UK) already provide values including charges. With Awattar, Nordpool Estonia and Energinet you can now add these.

By the way: If you have a dynamic electricity tariff that is not yet supported, but offers an API, please open a GitHub issue.

Battery settings​

A huge advantage that evcc has over other surplus charging solutions is the integration with the home battery. The configuration value prioritySoc can be used to control whether surplus solar energy should be charged into the home battery or the vehicle first.

In general, evcc tries to prevent the home battery from being unloaded into the vehicle battery in PV mode in order to avoid unnecessary conversion losses. However, with the value bufferSoc you can consciously dedicate a portion of the home battery to support charging.

You can also set the charging process to start automatically as soon as the battery has reached a certain state of charge (bufferStartSoc). The automatic charging starts even if the sun is not shining.

Solar %, price, CO₂ per charging session​

We also have something for the friends of data analysis. We now record the share of own solar energy (in %), the price (total and per kWh), the charging time and the average CO₂ emissions per charging session. You can switch between these values directly at the charging session.

New calculation of solar share​

If you have noticed that the share of solar energy has decreased slightly since one of the last versions, this is due to our new calculation. Until now, evcc has always distributed the ratio of grid and own energy evenly between house consumption and charging sessions.

We have now switched to a new model in which the house consumption first gets the green electricity and the remaining mix goes to the charging sessions. Thanks to @MarkusGH for the implementation. You can find more details about the model in the documentation.

Charging sessions overview​

The new values have of course also found their way into the overview of the charging sessions. Depending on the configuration, prices and CO₂ emissions can now also be seen here. In addition, we have completely redesigned the display and chosen a compact table display on a monthly basis. It can be filtered by charging point and vehicle.

If you need even more flexibility here, you can of course also use the CSV export or get the raw data directly via InfluxDB or MQTT.

Prioritization of charging points and vehicles​

If you have multiple charging points, you can use the priority setting to specify which one should be preferred. You can also make the prioritization dependent on the detected vehicle or control it via API. There is currently no configuration via the UI.

The prioritization function is also helpful if you use evcc to control other consumers, for example a heating rod or heat pump connected via the plugin interface. This way you can control them so that they only run when the car is not charging (enough).

What's next?​

Our backlog is well filled. These are the next big topics we want to tackle:

Config UI: All prerequisites are now met. Currently, vehicles can already be created in 🧪 experimental mode and the jump to network, PV or battery configuration is not far away. There is still a lot to do here, but the light at the end of the tunnel is visible.

Better planning: As mentioned above, we are working on integrating good PV forecasts into the planning algorithm and the UI. We also have a concept for supporting multiple charging plans.

Mode revision: evcc started as an application for PV surplus charging. In the meantime, the interaction with the home battery is also playing a major role. The topic of grid-friendly charging based on dynamic electricity tariffs or CO₂ emissions is also gaining momentum. Therefore, we will revise our charging modes (currently PV and Min+PV) and create more flexibility here.

Further new features​

This was a flyover at high level and from an end user perspective. Of course, there is also a lot of work going on under the hood.

• 🔌 Support for additional chargers from 22 new manufacturers
• 🌞🔋📟 Support for meter, PV and battery systems from 36 new manufacturers
• 🇬🇧 Website and documentation in English language. Thanks duckfullstop & carygravel 💚

If you want even more details, you are welcome to go through the release notes of the last 49(!) releases since the beginning of the year.

Thanks for your support of evcc!
evcc Core Team
@andig, @premultiply and @naltatis

Pünktlich am 11.1. haben wir mit dem Release 0.111 wieder einige neue Funktionen am Start die wir euch hier kurz vorstellen möchten.

🧞‍♂️ Neuer Ladeplaner: Erneuerbaren Netzstrom nutzen​

Die Zielladenfunktion gibt es in evcc schon seit einiger Zeit. Damit kannst du eine Zielzeit definieren zu der das verbundene Fahrzeug einen bestimmten Ladestand erreichen soll. Die Funktion ist bspw. praktisch um den Wagen vor längeren Fahrten pünktlich zur Abfahrt aufzuladen.

Die bisherige Ladestrategie war relativ simpel: Die Ladung wird möglichst spät gestartet, sodass der Akku pünktlich zur Abfahrt den gewünschten Stand erreicht hat. Das schont den Akku da er nicht lange auf hohen Ladeständen geparkt wird.

Mit diesem Release wird der Ladeplaner intelligenter und bezieht dynamische Energiepreise und CO₂-Daten mit ein. Damit wird die Ladung auf Zeitfenster geplant in denen besonders viel erneuerbarer Strom im Netz ist. Das spart Geld, entlastet das Stromnetz und reduziert den Bedarf an fossilien Energieträgern.

📈 Börsenpreise mit awattar und Tibber​

Die stundenabhängigen Tarife von awattar und Tibber haben wir schon länger angebunden. Bislang hatten wir aber nur eine einfache Steuerung, die das Laden unter einem vorher zu konfigurierenden Strompreis freigibt (cheap).

Jetzt werden die stündlichen Preise auch in der Ladeplanung verwendet und das Auto lädt dann wenn der Netzstrom besonders günstig ist.

Konfiguration für awattar

tariffs:
  grid:
    type: awattar
    region: de # or at

Konfiguration für Tibber

tariffs:
  grid:
    type: tibber
    token: "476...963a4" # access token

📊 Manuelle Zeittarife​

Es ist nun auch möglich Zeittarife zu hinterlegen. Hier eine Beispielkonfiguration für günstige Energie zu Nachtzeiten und noch günstigere Energie am Wochenende:

tariffs:
  grid:
    type: fixed
    price: 0.294 # EUR/kWh
    zones:
      - days: Mo-Fr
        hours: 2-5
        price: 0.2 # EUR/kWh
      - days: Sa,So
        price: 0.15 # EUR/kWh

Auch diese Preisdaten fließen in den neuen Planungsalgorithmus mit ein.

🌱 CO₂-Daten von GrünStromIndex und ElectricityMap​

Wer keinen dynamischen Stromtarif hat kann dennoch klimaschonen Laden. Dafür binden wir jetzt CO₂-Daten ein. Aktuell haben wir zwei Quellen implementiert. Wir sind aber offen für weitere Vorschläge.

GrünStromIndex liefert regionale Vorhersagen über die Sauberkeit des Netzstroms für Deutschland. Du musst lediglich deine Postleitzahl hinterlegen.

planner:
  type: grünstromindex
  zip: 12349

Electricity Map liefert weltweite Vorhersagen. Für die Nutzung in evcc benötigt Ihr ein Token und den URL Präfix. Diese Daten bekommst du mit dem kostenlosen Account im API portal.

planner:
  type: electricitymaps
  uri: https://api-access.electricitymaps.com/2w...1g/
  token: Rp...D2
  zone: DE

Ausblick​

Für eines der nächsten Releases arbeiten wir an einer visuellen Aufbereitung des Ladeplans. Dann kannst du auch die vom Algorithmus errechneten Zeitfenster und die konkrete Kosten- oder CO₂ Ersparnis sehen.

Weitere neue Funktionen​

Dieses Release enthält neben den üblichen kleinen Verbessungen und Bugfixes auch noch ein paar weitere neue Funktionen:

• 🔋🪫 Bessere Unterstützung von mehreren Hausakkus #5598
• 🌞 Unterstützung für FoxESS #5721
• 🔌 Unterstützung für den Tesla Wall Connector 3 #5341
• 🚙 Unterstützung für Volvo Fahrzeuge #5681
• 🏳️‍🌈 Drei neue UI Sprachen

Danke für eure Unterstützung!
evcc Core Team
@andig, @premultiply und @naltatis

It's been a few months since the last blog post. So it's time to give you a short summary and an overview of what has happened at evcc in the last eleven releases (v0.81 to v0.91).

New supported devices​

The list of hardware supported by evcc is growing steadily.

Charging stations 🔌​

We have added some wallbox integrations. Since evcc now also supports the very popular Bender Controller we were able to significantly expand the portfolie of supported devices.

Here are the manufacturers that have been added since the beginning of the year: Alphatec, Ebee, Ensto, Garo, HardyBarth, Innogy, Juice, Mennekes, OpenWB Pro, Optec, PC Electric, SmartWB, TechniSat, Tapo Smarthome, Ubitricity Vestel, Webasto. (All charging stations)

Vehicles 🚗 🛵​

Audi (e-tron), Cupra, Jaguar, Landrover, Mercedes, Silence S01, Smart. (All vehicles)

Inverters ☀️ 🔋​

SMA (Data Manager M Lite), Shelly (1PM, 3EM), Siemens (PAC 2200), OpenEMS, TQ. (All meters)

Grid meters 📟​

SMA (Data Manager M Lite), Shelly (1PM, 3EM), Siemens (PAC 2200), OpenEMS, TQ. (All meters)

RFID Support 🪪​

The wallboxes from Easee and Warp can now also use evcc's RFID function for vehicle detection.

Improved phase handling (1P/3P)​

The first version of phase switching for supported wallboxes has been available in evcc since mid last year. We were able to gain some experience and based on this we did a major redesign of the mechanism in February. This makes phase switching much more reliable and also behaves better in situations with unknown or implausible configuration or measurement values.

Templates and documentation​

In December we laid the foundations for a simpler initial setup with the CLI setup wizard evcc configure.

The configuration syntax of evcc is very flexible and powerful. For example, not yet officially supported devices can often be connected purely by configuration if you know the corresponding Modbus fields and JSON structures of the interface. In the now archived evcc-io/config repository we had collected example configurations that you could copy and paste into your own configuration.

Together with the command line wizard we introduced the concept of templates. Templates allow us to encapsulate boilerplate and internal device knowledge (protocols, address, data types, field names) in a clean way. The following example for setting up a Solarlog grid meter illustrates the change quite well:

Before:

meters:
  - name: my_solarlog
    type: custom
    power:
      source: calc
      add:
        - source: modbus
          uri: 192.168.0.77:502
          id: 1
          register:
            address: 3502
            type: input
            decode: uint32s
          scale: -1
        - source: modbus
          uri: 192.168.0.77:502
          id: 1
          register:
            address: 3518
            type: input
            decode: uint32s

After:

meters:
  - name: my_solarlog
    type: template
    template: solarlog
    usage: grid
    host: 192.168.0.77

The user now only needs to know the hostname or IP address of his Solarlog instance and enter it - protocol and data structure are encapsulated in the solarlog template.

Additionally, templates also receive a structured description of all required and optional parameters, as well as default values and localized help texts.

Since March we have converted the device documentation at docs.evcc.io to templates. The previous syntaxes still work of course. Since future features like the web-based setup (yes, that will come 😄) are based on type: template we recommend that you convert your existing configurations to the new format already now.

New localization: Lithuanian 🇱🇹​

With v0.91 we received a new localization. The evcc UI is now also available in Lithuanian. This is now the fourth language in addition to German, English and Italian. Many thanks RTTTC 💚.

Since our language knowledge is relatively limited, we are always grateful for translation contributions. There is currently no documentation for this, but if you are interested, just take a look at RTTC's Pull Request.

What's next?​

Some of you may have already seen it. With the next release evcc will get a completely redesigned user interface. This is already available in the current nightly builds and you can find here and here information about the development process. But more about that in the next blog article.

Bug fixes​

The last versions contained a number of bug fixes and many small improvements. You can find a detailed list via the changelog link below.

Changelogs​

Here you can find more details about the latest changes:

• Version 0.91
• Version 0.90
• Version 0.89
• Version 0.88
• Version 0.87
• Version 0.86
• Version 0.85
• Version 0.84
• Version 0.83
• Version 0.82
• Version 0.81

Auch dieses Jahr geht es weiter mit weiteren Aktualisierungen :) Zusätzlich zu den kleineren Updates mit 0.78 und 0.79, gibt es nun auch ein paar größere Änderungen mit der Version 0.80.

evcc configure Verbesserungen​

Wenn man eine Konfiguration mit evcc configure erstellt, wird zuerst nach dem eigenen Know How gefragt. So können fortgeschrittene Anwender die Konfiguration in technischen Bereichen etwas genauer einstellen. Dieser Modus ist weiterhin auch über evcc configure --advanced direkt verfügbar. Einsteiger empfehlen wir diesen Modus jedoch nicht, da mehr Know-How erforderlich ist.

Zustätzlich gibt es weitere Geräte Templates, Korrekturen an bisherigen Templates und weitere Einstellmöglichkeiten.

Sonnenenergieanteil und Ersparnis​

Das neue Ersparnisfeature zeigt dir an wie viel deines Ladestroms durch selbsproduzierte Sonnenenergie gedeckt werden konnte. Der Prozentwert wird unten rechts in der Ecke angezeigt. Beim Klick darauf bekommst du weitere Details in einem Dialog angezeigt. Dort siehst du neben der Energiemenge auch deinen effektiven Energiepreis und die Gesamtersparnis gegenüber reinem Netzbezug. Hier findest du mehr Informationen zur Berechnung und Preiskonfiguration.

Sponsoren finden in dem neuen Dialog unter dem Dankeschön-Konfetti-Button einen, *drumroll*, Link um unsere neuen evcc Sticker zu bekommen. Ihr seid die Besten. Danke für euren Support! 💚🥳

Docker​

Wer Docker verwendet, kann nun über die Tags latest jeweils die aktuelle Version verwenden. Mit dem Tag nightly gibt es dann täglich neue Builds, die aber noch nicht so gut getestet sein können. Weitere Informationen zur Docker Installation sind hier zu finden: Docker, Synology

Fehlerkorrekturen​

Diese Version enthält natürlich wieder eine Reihe von Fehlerkorrekturen und vielen kleinen Verbesserungen. Schaut euch gerne über den Changelog Link unten eine detaillierte Auflistung an.

Download & Installation​

• Debian, Ubuntu, Raspberry Pi
• macOS Homebrew
• Docker, Synology
• Manuell (inkl. Windows)

Changelog​

Version 0.80​

• Detaillierte Liste der Änderungen

Version 0.79​

• Detaillierte Liste der Änderungen

Version 0.78​

• Detaillierte Liste der Änderungen