How it works
A smart plan for your battery, refreshed every five minutes
Most batteries follow one rule all year. Watt iQ makes 288 decisions a day, each one based on the latest weather, the latest price and what your household is likely to do next. Here is what happens in each cycle.
Forecast
Work out what tomorrow looks like.
Watt iQ looks at the weather forecast to predict how much your solar panels will make. It looks at your own household's history, the day of the week and the season to predict how much power you will use and when. School holidays and a hot week both change the picture, so the forecast refreshes constantly.
Price
Find out what power is worth right now, and later today.
Through Localvolts, Watt iQ sees the live wholesale price every five minutes, the price your neighbours are offering, and the forecast for the rest of the day. Prices can swing from below zero in the middle of the day to many dollars per kilowatt hour on a hot evening.
Optimise
Choose the best plan for the whole day, then act on the next five minutes.
With a forecast and a price in hand, Watt iQ solves for the cheapest way to get your household through the day. Charge now while the sun is strong and prices are low. Hold through the afternoon. Sell a little into the evening spike. Then run the house on what is left. Five minutes later it does the whole thing again with fresh information.
Protect
Never put your family or your battery at risk.
Your backup reserve is a hard floor. Warranty cycle limits are a hard ceiling. If a storm is forecast, the battery fills early so you face any outage with a full charge. These rules sit above every trade and cannot be overridden by a price.
Report
Show you the money.
Each month Watt iQ compares what your battery actually did with what it would have done on its default setting, in dollars. You see what you saved on your bill and what you earned from selling. No spreadsheets needed.
Today's plan
A typical day, decided five minutes at a time
Next decision in --:--
- Hold
- Charge from solar
- Sell to the grid
- Power the house
- Overnight. Holds. Cheap grid power, nothing to gain.
- Morning. Charges from your solar while prices are low.
- Late afternoon. Sells spare energy as the evening price climbs.
- Evening. Powers your home and keeps your 30% backup.
An example day for a 28 kWh battery on a wholesale plan. Your plan will look different, because it is built from your home.
Three-phase homes
One battery, three phases, no waste
Many larger Australian homes have three-phase power, but a battery often connects to just one phase. The pool pump on phase two and the oven on phase three draw straight from the grid while the battery sits full. Watt iQ balances across all three phases so the battery covers the whole house, not a third of it.
On the roadmap
Electric cars, and beyond
The car is the biggest flexible load most households have. Next we will bring EV charging into the same five minute plan, so the car fills from the sun or from cheap overnight power and never fights the battery for the evening. After that, the same approach works in any market with live prices.
Ready to let your battery do the thinking?
Join the beta list and we will let you know when a place opens. From A$25 a month once we launch, and you keep full control of your backup.