Azure Automation to start/stop AKS cluster using Azure Automation Powershell Script
Create an Azure Automation Account through Azure Portal.
Make sure that the 'Create Azure Run As account' flag is active
Once your Automation account is created with the flag 'Create Azure Run As account' a new Service Principal will be created with the same name of your Automation Account plus a unique hash.
You should give Contributor permissions for this Service Principal in the AKS Clusters that you want to start/stop
Open your newly created Azure Automation account > Go to the Runbooks Tab and create a new 'Powershell Runbook' called AKS Start. In your Runbook details page, click edit to open the editor and paste the contents of the StartCluster.ps1 file.
In the line 4, change the parameters and fill the values with your AKS Service Name, AKS Service Resource Group and AKS Service Subscription. You can add multiple lines to Start/Stop multiple clusters.
After that, hit Save and Publish.
Next, create a new Runbook called AKS Stop and do the same process, but this time using the StopCluster.ps1 file(Don't forget to change the script with your AKS values), then again, hit Save and Publish.
The next step is to test if the script is running fine, go first to the AKS Stop Runbok and hit Start, check if any errors are shown in the logs and if your AKS Cluster is now in the Stopped/Stopping State.
Now, go to the AKS Start Runbook and hit Start, check if any errors are shown in the logs and if your cluster is now on the Running/Starting state.
If you want to create an schedule to automatically Start/Stop your cluster go to the Schedule tab in your Azure Automation Account and Create a new Schedules, after that go to your Runbooks and Link them to your schedules.