Introduction - Allen-Bradley 1408 Application Manual

PowerMonitor Products Application Guide

Introduction

As companies see significant savings through energy-efficiency projects, managing energy consumption, reducing
demand, and improving power quality have become an essential factors in reducing the overall cost of doing business. By
using smart power monitoring devices on a connected enterprise, power and energy data is readily available. This data
provides the information for companies to take action to reduce energy use while they consider energy as an ingredient of
production and a variable cost.
To manage energy effectively, knowledge of what happens is required. At times, energy is considered a hidden cost
because it's often unaccounted for when considering the cost that goes into the manufacturing of products. Labor and
materials are just part of the cost equation and when not properly managed, energy can become a significant portion of
the cost of doing business. As an energy consumer, it's important to start investigating the following issues:
Are your processes running as efficiently as possible?
Do you have high demand?
How consistent is your load?
Is it evenly distributed or do you have peaks where your load is excessively high?
Implementing power monitoring solutions provides a window of information on what's happening and the knowledge to
do something about it. It's understanding and answering the questions on where, when, and how much energy is being
consumed and having the ability to act. Finding the hidden energy costs can be a source of substantial savings for
manufacturers if they know where to look and have the ability to monitor usage in real time.
In addition to effectively managing power and energy, not overlooking the quality of the power that is received is
important. Utility providers are only responsible for providing a reliable source of power. Again, further investigation is
required:
How healthy is your energy (power)?
Are power quality issues affecting production equipment and shortening life spans?
Can power factor correction reduce utility penalties due to largely inductive motor loads?
Can harmonic analysis be used to determine problems with high-value production assets?
When events occur that affect the quality of the power, it is your responsibility to have proper monitoring and mitigation
solutions in place. Power Quality Management is critical to understanding the impact of power quality on equipment
and the associated costs that come with power quality (downtime, equipment damage, risk to personnel, maintenance
activities). Data must be collected on power quality events (voltage/current quality, harmonics, and transients) to
determine what impact they are having on the facility and a course of action to correct and prevent the issues going
forward.
By developing an integrated energy management program based on accurate consumption and spending patterns and
demand profiles, companies can calculate power consumption costs between their energy base load and various utility
equipment, production lines, or in the manufacturing of a specific product. With a more accurate determination of
actual product costs, managers are able to make more intelligent business decisions.
2 Rockwell Automation Publication 1400-AT001A-EN-P - September 2018