Energy Decision # 56 - Industrial Power Quality Solutions Explained: Diagnose First

All right, so let's start with what a power quality problem looks like from where you stand.

What are the warning signs? PLC, which stands for programmable logic controller, is the small industrial computer that runs the machine.

One warning sign is a PLC resetting for no reason.

Another is breakers tripping and fuses blowing with no identified cause.

Equipment running hot is a third.

Your backup power switching on more often than it should is a fourth.

Lost or corrupted data is a fifth.

Hartford Steam Boiler, an equipment insurer, lists all of these as warning signs.

They do not guarantee a problem, but they raise the odds you have one.

Power quality is how close the electricity reaching your equipment comes to an ideal.

Voltage is the electrical pressure that pushes current through your wires.

The ideal is voltage that rises and falls in a smooth, steady, repeating wave.

One full repeat of that wave is called a cycle.

Poor power quality is any departure from that smooth wave like dips, jumps, sudden bursts, distortion or a loss of power.

Here's why poor power quality costs you more today than it used to.

Older electromechanical equipment was robust.

It could handle minor power quality issues with little or no effect on operation.

Most plants have since replaced much of that equipment with electronic equipment.

That includes variable frequency drives, which are controllers that vary a motor's speed, along with computers, chargers, and inverters.

Electronic equipment is far less tolerant of a dirty wave.

It also draws power in uneven, rapidly changing patterns, so it creates disturbances as well as suffering from them.

Now, let's talk about where power quality problems start because that decides who fixes them.

Does the problem come from your utility or from inside your building? Most of the time, it comes from inside.

Ubiquia, a company that sells power monitoring equipment, states that the majority of power quality disturbances originate inside the facility.

Hartford Steam Boiler states that lightning, weather, and utility operations account for only a small portion of all electrical disturbances.

All right, so let's start with what a power quality problem looks like from where you stand.

What are the warning signs? PLC, which stands for programmable logic controller, is the small industrial computer that runs the machine.

One warning sign is a PLC resetting for no reason.

Another is breakers tripping and fuses blowing with no identified cause.

Equipment running hot is a third.

Your backup power switching on more often than it should is a fourth.

Lost or corrupted data is a fifth.

Hartford Steam Boiler, an equipment insurer, lists all of these as warning signs.

They do not guarantee a problem, but they raise the odds you have one.

Power quality is how close the electricity reaching your equipment comes to an ideal.

Voltage is the electrical pressure that pushes current through your wires.

The ideal is voltage that rises and falls in a smooth, steady, repeating wave.

One full repeat of that wave is called a cycle.

Poor power quality is any departure from that smooth wave like dips, jumps, sudden bursts, distortion or a loss of power.

Here's why poor power quality costs you more today than it used to.

Older electromechanical equipment was robust.

It could handle minor power quality issues with little or no effect on operation.

Most plants have since replaced much of that equipment with electronic equipment.

That includes variable frequency drives, which are controllers that vary a motor's speed, along with computers, chargers, and inverters.

Electronic equipment is far less tolerant of a dirty wave.

It also draws power in uneven, rapidly changing patterns, so it creates disturbances as well as suffering from them.

Now, let's talk about where power quality problems start because that decides who fixes them.

Does the problem come from your utility or from inside your building? Most of the time, it comes from inside.

Ubiquia, a company that sells power monitoring equipment, states that the majority of power quality disturbances originate inside the facility.

Hartford Steam Boiler states that lightning, weather, and utility operations account for only a small portion of all electrical disturbances.