A grid-tied solar installation in Canada typically includes a string inverter or microinverters on the roof array, a bidirectional meter installed by the utility, and either a net metering or net billing arrangement depending on the province. The utility meter shows the net energy exchanged with the grid, but it does not show what the array is generating at any given moment or how that generation compares to the home's consumption. A local monitoring dashboard fills that gap.
This article covers how to retrieve generation data from common inverter brands available in the Canadian market, how to add a consumption measurement layer, and how to display that combined data in an open-source dashboard that runs on a local server rather than a manufacturer's cloud.
Data Sources: Inverter Communication
The starting point is understanding how your inverter communicates. Most inverter brands sold in Canada fall into one of three categories: those that expose a local Modbus TCP or RS-485 interface, those that use a proprietary cloud API that can be polled locally with a reverse-engineered integration, and those that require a local data logger device to relay communication.
SolarEdge
SolarEdge inverters are among the most widely installed in Ontario and British Columbia. They expose a Modbus TCP interface on port 1502 when enabled through the SetApp commissioning application. The register map is documented in SolarEdge's SunSpec Modbus implementation technical note. Home Assistant's SolarEdge Modbus integration reads AC power output, daily yield, and string-level current and voltage from this interface without requiring a cloud account.
Fronius
Fronius Symo and Primo inverters — common in Alberta and Manitoba installations — include a built-in REST API accessible over the local network. The Solar API v1 endpoint at /solar_api/v1/GetPowerFlowRealtimeData.fcgi returns current AC power, daily yield, and whether the system is currently exporting or importing from the grid. No authentication is required by default on the local network. Home Assistant's Fronius integration and openHAB's Fronius binding both use this endpoint.
Enphase Microinverters
Enphase systems use the IQ Gateway (formerly Envoy) as the local data aggregator. The gateway exposes a local JSON API at /api/v1/production that returns aggregate AC production and individual microinverter readings. Recent Enphase firmware has restricted direct access to the local API without authentication tokens. The Home Assistant Enphase Envoy integration handles the token authentication flow for firmware versions 7.x and later.
Adding Consumption Measurement
Generation data alone tells you how much electricity the array is producing, but not how much the home is using at the same time. To calculate self-consumption (the share of solar production used in the home rather than exported) you need a consumption measurement as well.
The most common approach for Canadian grid-tied installations uses a current transformer (CT) clamp on the main service conductors inside the electrical panel. CT-based energy monitors — such as the Emporia Vue, which has Canadian-market models — clip non-invasively onto the hot conductors and send measurements to a hub device. The hub integrates with Home Assistant over the local network. Adding CT clamps on individual branch circuits allows appliance-level breakdown alongside the solar generation figures.
Note that installing CT clamps inside an electrical panel requires opening the panel, which in most Canadian provinces must be done by a licensed electrician. The monitor itself does not modify any wiring — the clamps are clamped around existing conductors without breaking the circuit — but the panel door must be open to access the bus bars. Some electricians will perform a CT installation during a service call if the monitor hardware is already on hand.
Time-of-Use Rate Awareness
Ontario residents on Hydro One or Toronto Hydro time-of-use rates pay different per-kWh prices depending on whether they draw power during on-peak, mid-peak, or off-peak periods. A solar monitoring dashboard that overlays the TOU rate schedule on the generation and consumption timeline makes it easy to see whether the array is generating enough during on-peak hours to avoid drawing from the grid at the highest rates.
Most open-source dashboard tools allow custom time-based annotations. In Home Assistant's Energy dashboard, the TOU rate periods can be modelled by creating template sensors that return the current rate multiplier, which the energy dashboard then uses to calculate cost.
Open-Source Dashboard Options
Home Assistant Energy Dashboard
Home Assistant includes an energy management dashboard in its standard installation. Once the solar generation source and grid consumption source entities are configured, the dashboard automatically calculates self-consumption, grid export, and daily, weekly, and monthly totals. It requires that the inverter and consumption monitor data be available as Home Assistant sensor entities — which they will be if the integrations described above are configured.
Grafana with InfluxDB
For more detailed time-series visualisation, Grafana connected to an InfluxDB instance provides flexible charting that Home Assistant's built-in dashboard does not. Home Assistant can push its sensor history to InfluxDB through the InfluxDB integration. Grafana dashboards can then display solar generation against consumption as overlapping area charts, calculate rolling averages, and flag intervals where consumption exceeded generation.
Both Grafana and InfluxDB are available as Docker containers or as Home Assistant OS add-ons. The Home Assistant community forum has detailed setup walkthroughs for this combination.
Net Metering Records and Export Tracking
Canadian net metering arrangements credit exported energy against future consumption. Keeping an independent export record through a local dashboard — timestamped to match the billing period — allows cross-checking against utility statements and identifying discrepancies. This is especially useful in provinces where the net metering credit rate differs from the consumption rate, or where credits expire at the end of an anniversary period.
Home Assistant's energy dashboard tracks grid export as a separate cumulative figure. Setting up a utility meter helper that resets on the billing cycle start date produces a figure directly comparable to the utility invoice line item.
System Performance Benchmarking
A monitoring dashboard is most useful when it is compared against an expected performance baseline. Tools like NREL's PVWatts calculator can generate monthly expected production figures for a Canadian location using historical weather data. Plotting actual generation against PVWatts estimates makes it straightforward to identify underperforming months that warrant investigation — whether from shading, soiling, degradation, or inverter fault conditions.