Home Power Monitoring with the Emporia VUE and Home Assistant.

[@rsluggy6485]

I have had my Emporia Vue in place for about a year and have been looking for something besides the phone app to interact and automate with it. Having just started playing with Home Assistant, I did some digging and found this integration. I had to try it out! Thanks for the detailed instructions, although I had to pause the video for about an hour while I figured out how to add HACS to my Docker installation of Home Assistant. Now I know all those things, too! It has been an exciting 24 hours.

[@mostlychris]

Woohoo! Congrats!

[@rsluggy6485]

@@mostlychris LOL In the intervening couple of days, it became apparent that the container version I chose was a little too limiting in other ways. Still having no suitable Pi devices on hand or immediately available, I am now running HA on a virtual machine instead, still hosted on my otherwise underworked NAS. My Zwave and Zigbee USB sticks arrived yesterday, so fingers crossed. Goodbye Vera?

[@mostlychris]

@@rsluggy6485 I got rid of Vera years ago. It might be better now, but it was very painful to configure and crashed often, usually at the worst times.

[@rsluggy6485]

@@mostlychris I had to do the firmware update thing on the Aeotec Z-stick 7 (*that* was an adventure) and Zwave JS was not quite as intuitive as I had hoped, but I have added my first ZWave device to HA as of literally a few minutes ago.

[@korykearney6497]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who isn't able to click on the selections. I did find you can use your arrows though. I had no idea it was a Chrome issue. As far as the those who want to use this and be out of the cloud, someone has come up with a new firmware you can flash on this. I haven't tried it, I'm using circuit setup but I did see a video on it the other day.

[@mostlychris]

I think Digiblur did a video on it with ESPHome. I haven't tried that yet but might. Haven't felt like taking the electrical panel apart again yet. Thanks for the tip on the arrows. I have no idea why I can't click with Chrome. Works fine in Firefox.

[@matwatson7274]

Thanks for the vid. I recently installed Emporia had hadn’t realized the notifications have been fully enabled now. This allows an alternative way of tracking a circuit outage. Having lost a freezer full of food recently due to a tripped breaker, I love this feature. Much easier than doing it HA

[@mostlychris]

Thanks for sharing! HA is awesome, but native alerts and automations are definitely an option as well.

[@ThyAnarchist87]

You could still place the antenna outside the box through the side. Sure the antenna will be behind sheetrock but that's much better than the metal box its in.

[@MyBluetti]

Thank you! You saved me allot of time from having to figure this out by myself!

[@mostlychris]

You're welcome!

[@JuanPabloCook]

Thanks. This is using default setup without flashing esphome to the emporia right? Does it makes a difference flashing esphome?

[@midafricam]

Awesome video, thanks for the video, first time visitor, great content

[@mostlychris]

Thanks!

[@craigharrison6531]

Great video - thanks! I'm looking for similar instruction to integrate my Vue with HA Core in a Docker container on Raspberry Pi4.

[@anthonycalia1317]

Very helpful and informative video. Thanks

[@mostlychris]

Glad it was helpful!

[@tom95521]

The web portal link on their home page appears to be working. Is there a subscription fee after purchase to use the web interface? It doesn't appear they have published a public API.

[@dubmob151]

I'm coming from more familiarity with the Eyedro2 energy monitor, and it seems the Vue2 app capability for data graphing review is very rudimentary compared with the Eyedro implementation. There's no way to select the date to be charted, so it always needs to be scrolled to from the present time back to the period of interest. That is impractical when trying to use the seconds or minutes granularity because it's very slow, and doesn't display the date in the seconds view, so you lose track of what day it's showing, if you're able to scroll back that far. With the eyedro, the app allows date selection and pinch and zoom capability, which makes it very easy. Does Graphana run only on the PC and offer the ability to save and display seconds granularity of the recorded data? It would be ideal if it were available on the phone app, but the home assistant and Grafana might be a way to get that capability.

[@jkotecki1]

Great video! I'm new to Home Assistant and have an Aeotec HEM Gen 5. Can you point me to your videos where you talk about that monitor? Also, since I haven't installed my HEM yet, would you recommend the Emporia over the Aeotec when using HA?

[@emmgeevideo]

At 9:54: "I didn't read the directions". Be sure you use a licensed professional (doesn't sound like you are). I'm glad you're still around.

[@desdonaghy]

Where do I get the Home Assistant Energy Portal?

[@vcmdpropulsion126]

is there a app that i can add smart devices that are not the same company . i got the emporia vue 2 and i already have some smart plugs from switch bot.

[@wstewart5532]

Chris - great video. A question on the Emporia unit though. An Amazon review stated the app connects to the Emporia cloud to display usage. Is this true? In my case I want to view real time backup generator load during a power outage, so my home wifi will be working but usually we lose the internet. I want to connect to the Emporia just using my local wifi and monitor my generator load. Will it work this way?

[@mostlychris]

Thanks! The Emporia out of the box relies on the cloud so if you lose internet, you'll lose power monitoring. In addition, since this is a wifi device, unless your wifi remains active it won't work either. I think DigiBlur just did a video on Emporia with ESP that might bring it local control. kzbin.info/www/bejne/sGGtp2ekhJ6Cjck

[@WavePuntFrl]

Hi Chris, thanks for the video's and the time you put in it. I would like to aks you if you're still using the Emporia and what do you think about it after using it for a time. Would you buy it again or would you choose for another option? (I also planed to use it with hass is verry near future)

[@mostlychris]

I am still using it. It has been flawless. The only part of it that I would like to see is local access. Since it transmits every second, that data has to go to the cloud and then be consumed by the integration in Home Assistant so keeping it local would save some bandwidth. I know that there are those that have flashed this with Tasmota for local access but I have not done this as it works for me reliably so far.

[@ddemier]

Just purchased an Emporium from Amazon. How do I know if its a generation 1 or a generation 2? I bought one with 16 clamps

[@____Mr.Happy____]

It shows on the side of the box GEN2 VUE

[@mindracing]

Another excellent video, Chris, thank you. I've ordered an Emporia Vue. I'm wondering if you know if the HACS integration can support more than one Emporia?

[@mostlychris]

Hmmm, I haven't considered that. I don't know. It looks at your Emporia account so maybe if you have more than one on there it does???

[@mindracing]

@@mostlychris I now have 5 Vue 2s and they do, indeed, all work with HACS via the Emporia account. However, as I’m finding the Emporia data a bit limiting I’m converting them all over to ESPhome which also keeps my data local. You could do an excellent tutorial on that!

[@mboarman1]

Chris - Another great video! Thanks for sharing. Quick question, I'm interested in getting one of these to solve two problems. One to monitor my over energy usage with home assistant. And secondly, I would like to create a sensor using the Vue to monitor when my washing machine and dyer have completed a cycle and send an alert. In your experience with the Emporia, would I be able to monitor the washer and dryer in real time and create an automation to alert me when the usage dips (cycle ends)?

[@mostlychris]

Absolutely. As long as your washer and dryer are on their own circuits, you could use those circuit's entities to send an alert if they power usage drops below a certain threhsold for x minutes. That's how I do it with my washer.

[@kelsvideo1]

Do you know what the “balance” is reading in the graph that shows all the circuits on the system? I’m not sure if I have something unknown drawing energy or if it’s the balance of what I’m. It using.

[@mostlychris]

It's the remaining amount from the main sensors that isn't accounted for in the individual sensors. Could mean you are not tracking some load.

[@OthmanAlikhan]

Thanks for the video =)

[@mostlychris]

Sure thing!

[@velvetpigcnc]

Hi, Your Energy page looks different to mine. Om mine i have no colors and looks chunky. Should i reinstall every thing?

[@mostlychris]

I wouldn't reinstall. Can you send me a screenshot on Discord?

[@markhoffman]

where in BC are you?

[@markhoffman]

I was thinking Disposal Fridge was where the bodies are kept.

[@jonkjon]

I have two 200 amp panels which normally would require 2 of the vue devices. Could I then add each panel as a consumption and then choose each of the individual devices (up to 32 of them and the CTs)? I can't find any information as to whether or not Emporia have added the ability to combine two panels in the app. Thanks for the video!

[@mostlychris]

Um.. I don't know about that. A quick search shows some experimenting with this and someone mentioned having two VUEs in the same app. That is going to be a help question for Emporia I think.

[@jonkjon]

@@mostlychris Just a follow-up. When using two separate VUEs, HomeAssistant combines the total kWh usage on the energy graph and the grid to home animation. You can also easily monitor each VUE's CT as individual devices. It works great. Thanks again for the video.

[@geglne]

What if I have more than 16 breakers?

[@YKSGuy]

Every time I see these energy monitors installed I see two odd issues. 1. on main panels the two top wires tend to be always hot, I see no cut off so maybe it is elsewhere in your home and off. All of the energy monitors warn that the clamps can generate power out the little headphone jack things and should be plugged into the main unit before connecting them to ANY live feeds like the main feed. 2. Wifi is MOSTLY blocked by the big metal box but NOT drywall.. Just poke the antenna out a knockout at the top or bottom of the panel from the inside to get WAY better reception. It will be inside the wall but the wood and drywall will not really block WiFi like having the antenna in the actual box.

[@mostlychris]

1. The main shutoff is outside for this sub panel. 2. I didn't worry about wifi signal as the AP is only a few feet away from this box so I didn't have any issues.

[@jmgc97]

Can you do a grafana/influxdb for the emporia vue? thank you for the helpful videos!

[@mostlychris]

Hey Chino. I did a little bit of Grafana in this video. What were you specifically looking for?

[@jmgc97]

@@mostlychris it is! sorry... i did not watch it all the way because i thought it was just about the emporia device... thank you again!

[@wollinger]

4:46, i can locate Vue on my list. mine is v0.7.2 but it doesnt show there

[@mostlychris]

can or can't? Did you install the HACS add-on first?

[@zyghom]

we are waiting for... LOCAL integration without going to the cloud ;-) - nice though

[@mostlychris]

I, too, am not a fan of being dependent on the cloud. Make enough noise and maybe some of these manufacturers will open a a local API connection. It has happened with other products in the Home Automation space.

[@Tanstaaflitis]

If you're willing to hack the device, there are alternative firmware that can be flashed to it. It's just an ESP32 microcontroller image.

[@jasonsmall5602]

Who are you afraid is going to steal your credentials when not on ssl? Or, how do you think they would do it?

[@mostlychris]

Not sure I understand the question.

[@jasonsmall5602]

@@mostlychris You state that the emporia beta site is not SSL protected and you should change your password after using it. Assuming you are accessing from home, and not some public wifi, how do you think your credentials would be leaked, or who would care to see your credentials? Either your home network is already compromised, in which case you have a problem anyway, or some ISP along the way is compromised, in which case a lot of people have a problem, regardless of whether SSL is used.

[@mostlychris]

The beta site (which has now been moved) was hosted at Amazon on a non SSL (non https) site which means my credentials would have had to travel from my home over the public internet to reach the beta site and be exposed all along the way. It wasn't an internal network thing. Since posting that video, Emporia has released an SSL enabled beta site that I have played with. Looks just like the app only on a browser.

[@jasonsmall5602]

@@mostlychris Thank you for your reply. I guess I'm just a lot less paranoid than you are. 1) My emporia credentials don't matter that much and of course are different from other credentials 2) I don't think anyone would care to get them 3) A breach of my ISP's or Amazon's network would be a huge deal, regardless of my emporia credentials. I have a hard time believing that people (other than government agencies) are somehow out there, slurping up internet traffic. That's a tremendously difficult task to do. I don't just mean to criticize. Thank you for your videos, they're very helpful.

[@rjchu]

For those of you wanting a local option, these devices have an esp32 in them. Anyone care to write an alternative firmware?

[@mostlychris]

I'd be happy to test if anyone wants to send me something that'll work locally. I wonder if Emporia would be interested in making some local access available.

[@cdoublejj]

as long as this things works through wifi and not that zigbee and z wave crap. lora wan waxes the floor with both.but, i'm already out fitted with wifi.

[@mostlychris]

This uses wifi.

[@TheBeardedLibertarian]

throw the main breaker before you start....

[@mostlychris]

Yep. Exercise safety. Need a generator or battery powered studio lights so I (and youtube) can see what I'm doing..

[@DesertGardenPrepper]

nice! comment removed.

[@mostlychris]

Did you remove the comment or did YT do it?

[@DesertGardenPrepper]

@@mostlychris I didn't, but I assumed you did, because I said I don't like cloud dependent solutions when local solutions are available. been looking at IoTaWatt and hoping they get their ESPHome worked into the project. good to know it wasn't you... it irritates me when channels delete anything but fanboy comments 😆

[@mostlychris]

Definitely wasn't me. Yes, cloud dependency is an issue and I'd prefer local. If I can get my hands on an iota watt I might try that one too.