Connecting the Zappi to a home battery & Tesla Powerwall
Charging your EV with the Zappi shouldn’t be complicated but if you want to minimize your grid usage and charge when the sun isn’t out, pulling power from a solar battery in your home can be a little tricky to get your head around. Let’s break it down and explore charging from a home battery.
The Zappi is designed to integrate with home battery systems like the Tesla Powerwall, units that charge and store power from your renewable sources; however, a few things must be done to seamlessly integrate your Zappi and control your power usage and priority.
First, CT Clamps. You’ve probably heard of them if you have renewable power in your home but let’s go through them with a simple explanation. CT Clamps or current clamps are magnetic clamps that attach to your power wires, designed to measure the electrical flow and direct said flow, connecting your devices to your renewable options and the grid. CT clamps are a necessary part of your Zappi connection if you want to regulate the power usage in your home.
Zappi units have two CT clamp slots as CT clamps are used for other power measuring aside from batteries. If you run out if available CT slots on your Zappi, myenergi also create the harvi, a CT clamp hub that can take in 3 more sets of CT data and communicates this data wirelessly between all your myenergi units, including the Zappi. If you need to connect a battery to your Zappi and don’t have the CT slots, the harvi is your best option.
So now you know what you need to connect your Zappi to a battery but how do we control how the Zappi interacts with it?
Well, the Zappi has built in battery controls for you to specify how the Zappi charges your EV. There are 5 available modes for interacting with a battery on the Zappi.
The Avoid Drain and Avoid Charge functions are the most useful, allowing you to prioritise the energy in your battery for other functions in your home, like water heating.
And finally, here is where you can get your own Zappi!