Is your power factor correction equipment working?

PFC Engineering increasingly finds that routine inspection and maintenance of power factor correction equipment is often given low priority or even overlooked; do you know if yours is working?

In the light of the climate change levy, there has been a massive focus on improving energy efficiency.

One way of doing this is to improve the power factor of a plant and thus fully utilise the electrical power being paid for.

By installing power factor correction capacitors, the user can achieve many benefits, such as increasing system capacity, improving voltage and reducing heat losses.

It therefore seems logical that the power factor equipment being installed should be of sufficiently high quality to last for long periods of time and not require expensive maintenance, which represents additional downtime.

What is more, the equipment should be provided with a maintenance contract, so that qualified operatives can service and attend to it, in order to optimise its lifespan and efficiency.

Despite this, PFC Engineering increasingly finds that existing power factor equipment has been ignored, leading to malfunction, operating failures and, in some cases, complete breakdown.

This can be expensive, as savings on electricity tariff penalties are irretrievably lost.

In addition, as a symptom of business restructuring in the nineties, many companies now find themselves with much reduced maintenance teams.

Consequently, routine inspection and maintenance of power factor correction equipment is often given low priority or even overlooked.

This again can result in the loss of savings, or at worst, might result in the total failure of the power factor correction unit.

Compounding this error, many sites increase load without making provision for further power factor correction measures.

In addition, if a site operates to the limit of its supply capabilities, it can lose its supply if its power factor equipment fails.

Furthermore, all capacitors have a finite life and, sometimes, when failure occurs, no real warning is given.

In fact, contactors may continue to operate and indicator lights might still switch on and off, but the capacitors themselves may have malfunctioned.

Modern capacitors, which incorporate fail-safe protection, can quietly disconnect themselves if they go wrong and thus failure is more likely to go undetected! Modern networks are frequently subjected to adverse system transients and harmonics, which make regular maintenance of power correction equipment even more essential.

Indeed, the newly introduced EA G5/4 Recommendations demand control of harmonic disturbance all the way to the 50th harmonic.

One must also bear in mind that there are likely to be a few capacitors still in circuit that are filled and impregnated with highly toxic and carcinogenic PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls).

This is now illegal and can result in significant penalties.

PFC Engineering is both licensed and insured to remove and arrange the disposal of PCBS.

PFC Engineering has an efficient low cost nationwide inspection and maintenance service, which includes a power factor survey and report after each visit.

Maintenance contract quotations can be based on a simple site visit accompanied by details of the equipment in use.

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