Electrical Troubleshooting Quiz, Dec. 23, 2013

Dec. 23, 2013
What should you do if, despite lowering the air pressure from 100 PSI to 90 PSI on a bank of suspect air compressors, they're consuming even more electricity than ever?

Last summer, the electric bill was especially high (even compared to the previous hot summer). Fortunately, your facility has a power monitor and it even goes beyond just the service gear to look at specific key loads. One of the loads it looks at is the bank of air compressors that supply plant air.

In June, the facilities manager noticed excessive electrical consumption by this bank of air compressors so lowered the air pressure from 100 PSI to 90 PSI under the theory they would run less to maintain this lower pressure. Yet, they use more.

What’s going on?

Excessively purging the dryer drains drops the air pressure. That degrades dryer performance and also increases load cycling of the air compressors to put more water in the system. The operators were probably performing additional purges of last spring (the wet season).

Take a whiff of the compressed air. If it stinks, there’s still a whole lot of excess purgin’ goin’ on. To solve for this cause, ensure the collectors get properly cleaned.

The air dryer for an industrial compressed air system is usually designed for 100 PSI. But your facility manager has dropped the system pressure to 90 PSI, so there’s more water and more draining, and thus more compressor load to accommodate and more power consumed.

So first, correct the air pressure. Then use that power monitor to analyze at the quality of the power quality on the feeders to these compressors. This will reveal power anomalies that need attention.

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