Grid balance
Positive means you import electricity from the public grid. Negative means you export your surplus to it. This reading alone is not your whole household use.
Graph label: Grid import / export
Your energy, explained
Nomenclature
Where does your electricity go?
A simple guide to the names, units and battery flows used on the home page, in power graphs and in the energy dashboard.
A battery changes when energy is used.Charging keeps energy for later. Discharging releases it to power your appliances. The household total takes both directions into account.
Each arrow shows a possible direction. These flows do not all have to happen at the same time.
Four flows, one household total
Start with the direction: electricity coming in, going out or being stored.
Solar production
The power produced by your panels. It can supply appliances, charge the battery or be exported to the grid.
Graph label: Solar panel production
Battery charge and discharge
Discharging supplies energy: add it. Charging stores energy: subtract it. Both readings are positive amounts; the formula gives them their signs.
Graph label: Battery discharging power / Battery charging power
Total household use
The power used by appliances, lighting and other household equipment. Energy being stored in the battery is left out of this total.
Graph label: Total power
The calculation
What does “total” include?
On the home page and in the power graphs, all the terms below are in watts (W). The grid term already includes exports as a negative value.
HomeHousehold use =Grid+ import / − export +SolarProduction +DischargeFrom the battery −ChargeInto the battery
Charging is subtracted because that electricity is being saved for later, rather than used by household appliances now. Battery discharge is added when that stored energy is released. If either battery flow is missing, the total uses only the grid balance and solar production.
Solar, grid and battery work together
You import 500 W, the panels produce 1,000 W and the battery supplies 300 W without charging. Your home uses 1,800 W.
500 + 1,000 + 300 − 0 = 1,800 W
Some energy is stored, some is exported
The panels produce 1,000 W. You export 200 W (grid: −200 W) and charge the battery at 300 W, with no discharge. Your home uses the remaining 500 W.
−200 + 1,000 + 0 − 300 = 500 W
W and kWh: a moment or a period?
Power tells you how fast electricity is used. Energy tells you how much was used over time.
W
Watts measure power
A reading at a particular moment. A 1,000 W heater uses electricity twice as fast as a 500 W heater while they are running.
kWh
Kilowatt-hours measure energy
An amount accumulated over a period. The energy dashboard adds up the changing power readings across the selected hours or days.
1,000 W running for 1 hour uses 1 kWh.
For constant power: multiply watts by hours, then divide by 1,000 to get kWh.
Read the energy dashboard
These columns describe the selected period. All energy values are in kWh.
| Dashboard label | What it means |
|---|---|
| Consumption on network | Electricity taken from the grid. Imports are counted as a positive amount, separately from exports. |
| Solar panel production energy | Electricity produced by the solar panels during the period. |
| Battery discharging energy | Energy released from battery storage. A positive amount added to household use. |
| Battery charging energy | Energy put into battery storage. A positive amount subtracted from household use. |
| Total energy used | Energy used by the household: grid imports + the displayed export value (already negative) + solar + battery discharge − battery charge. If either battery flow is unavailable, both battery terms are left out. |
| Energy Introduced | Surplus sent to the grid. This dashboard displays it as a negative number: −2 kWh means 2 kWh were exported. |
| Energy saved | Total household energy minus grid imports. An estimate in kWh, not money saved or lower household use. Battery energy is included only when both charging and discharging data are available. It may have been stored in an earlier period or charged from the grid. |
Battery level (%) is a different measure.
SOC means state of charge: how full the battery is. 60% describes its charge level, not a power in W or an energy in kWh.
Unavailable does not mean zero.
Zero is a measured absence of flow. Unavailable means data is missing or incomplete. Without battery history, household totals use the grid balance plus solar production. Energy saved is calculated from that total. Battery columns remain unavailable. Grid and solar readings are still needed.
Past reports stay available.
Saved reports keep their recorded totals. If a total was left unavailable because battery data was missing, the display estimates it from the saved grid and solar values. The saved report itself is unchanged.