Opinion About Voltage Regulation Device

[kingtech]

Hello,

I am looking for information about electro-mechanical voltage regulation devices. I am currently advising a client about a voltage regulation product they are considering installing at their facility. The product is targeted for low voltage facility level applications and employs a combination of electrical and mechanical devices (fairly sure about this) for voltage regulation. The idea is that the device steps down the voltage form the mains and supposedly saves energy.

The features are as follows:

- No distortion of supply side power signal;
- Less than 1% losses;
- Micro-stepped voltage regulation in less than 0.1 volt increments;
- Passive power factor correction;

The units are installed for each phase and controlled such that voltage is balanced to the same output voltage.

I am not an electrical engineer, but it seems that employing technology that employs a mechanical device would be hard to achieve such inefficiencies. Each unit has up to 10 "modules." It seems the device would employ some sort of electrical storage generator device, like a very small flywheel.

I am just wondering if anyone has seen such small flywheel technology and if it seems plausible that a mechanical based voltage regulation technology could have less than 1% losses?

This is the sort of black box device for which the supplier is claiming very high electrical energy savings. I have seen many such products before, and am highly skeptical, but never one that employs some sort of mechanical devices.

Any opinions are greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

 

[kingtech]

I should also mention that the device uses tapless voltage regulation.

 

[catserveng]

Flywheel UPS systems have been around for a while, when I worked for a CAT dealer we carried a line of them. Here is a link to some resources from one manufacturer,

http://www.activepower.com/resource-library/#whitepapers

I recently worked on some smaller units, about 35 kVA each being used by the military. These had the ability to be "daisy chained to achieve higher total outputs. These were used to provide clean power to some electronic systems in the field.

There are case studies comparing cost savings between static (battery type) and flywheel UPS systems. But based on your comments above, unless you are seeing issues in your facility due to large voltage imbalance or power quality problems, not sure installing the described "black box" is going to actually save you anything. Do you have an existing UPS system you are trying to replace, or is this just to reduce utility billing?

MikeL.

 

[kingtech]

Many thanks for the reply and information. As I mentioned, I am highly skeptical about the savings claims as well. It is above 10% and I think the most savings that could be achieved from grid supplied electricity due to over-voltage would be in the 3%-5% range based on a LBL study I read on conservation voltage regulation and voltage optimization. This facility for the installation is in a large, modern city and next to another high profile, really power hungry, high tech research facility. I can't imagine the power quality being really that bad.

Regardless of the savings claims, I am just pondering how this device would work and if anything that relied on a mechanical device for regulation could have such a high electrical efficiency. The system is fairly small - perhaps no more than a meter high - about 30 cm deep and wide. I know this is a lame description, but I thought I would share it.

Based on the Activepower white paper on efficiency, it seems very unlikely to achieve better than 99% efficiency for any electrical generator-regulator. Activepower says they can only achieve 98%. As I mentioned, I do not know what is in the black box and only have a marketed brochure. It specifically says that it uses mechanical regulation. I think ActivePower would probably be considered one of the best in the business, so I tend to believe the white paper.

The supplier says the regulation is switchless as well. Could a servo controlled aparatus be considered switchless and tapless? Sorry, I am not an electrical engineer.

Sorry, due to confidentiality, I can't provide any pictures, but I would appreciate any more feedback about the device.

Thanks!