meteocontrol’s bluelog Neo targets grid-code compliance for hybrid PV-BESS plants

Meteocontrol has launched bluelog Neo, a plant controller for solar, battery storage, and hybrid renewable energy assets, positioning the device around grid-code compliance and cybersecurity for increasingly complex, larger-scale projects.

The device combines power control, monitoring, and energy management in a single unit, built on a new hardware architecture with an internal A/B system for fail-safe software updates. Two physically separated Ethernet interfaces separate the internal plant network from grid-facing and external communications.

Licensing scales by total installed capacity rather than a fixed device ceiling. Stijn Stevens, meteocontrol’s managing director and chief technology officer, said the controller can be cascaded in a master/slave configuration, with roughly 100 TCP/IP-connected devices per node and each of those devices supporting another 100 in turn.

Stevens said the practical limit on scale likely comes from grid-code timing constraints, citing steady-state response as an example that would need to be checked case by case. Separately, meteocontrol’s own zero-feed-in configuration guidance documents a 500-millisecond dead time for the bluelog platform; the company has not stated that figure as a grid-code or certification requirement.

For German medium- and high-voltage applications, bluelog Neo is being developed to VDE-AR-N 4110/4120, the framework governing grid connection requirements for storage and generation units connected at medium voltage, applicable from a 100 kVA threshold.

Certification follows the FGW testing chain: TR3 for type testing of electrical characteristics, TR4 for unit model validation, and TR8 for final certification. meteocontrol said validation included 64 hardware-in-the-loop tests. The same certified functionality will be made available to the earlier blue’Log XC platform via a software upgrade.

On cybersecurity, the device uses Secure Element and Secure Boot technologies. Meteocontrol said encryption keys are stored in a FIPS 140-3 Level 3-certified key-storage environment, a standard governing cryptographic module security. Full alignment with IEC 62443-4-2 is planned for the first quarter of 2027, with Cyber Resilience Act implementation also scheduled for 2027.

Bluelog Neo is backward-compatible with blue’Log XM and XC installations, including physical interfaces and configuration backups, and supports MX modules from prior-generation systems. The device is meteocontrol’s first major hardware generation change since the original blue’Log launched at Intersolar in 2015 and received an operating system update in 2018.

Bluelog Neo is expected to be available in the fourth quarter of 2026.