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| Building
Products -> Power Quality |
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  Your
computer crashes in the middle of an important assignment -
and you lost 2 hours of work! Or, your manufacturing plant suddenly
shuts down when lightning strikes in your home town.
Power quality problems that plague many modern offices and factories
are largely preventable. Copper-intensive solutions include
using larger neutral conductors to handle harmonic loads, better
grounding systems to dissipate transients and lightning, and
fewer outlets per circuit to lessen interaction between office
equipment and computers.
The proliferation of computers and other sensitive devices in
our manufacturing and office environments has fostered the need
to design the electrical systems with an eye towards power quality
issues. Today, electrical designers must deviate from the outmoded
formulas for electrical loads for a given floor area if they
are to ensure power quality for all consumers.
Power quality often refers to an evaluation of the frequency
and severity of deviations from the customary 60 Hz sinusoidal
waveform of voltage of power supplied to electrical equipment.
"Poor power quality" refers to deviations from the norms in
the power supply that can cause equipment mis-operation or failure.
"Good power quality" conversely means that there is a low level
of such deviations or mis-operations.
Poor power quality affects the reliable operation of computers
and other sensitive equipment. The most serious consequence
of poor power quality is typically not damage to physical hardware,
but rather lost data, reduced productivity, and costly downtime.
Many different types of equipment can cause power quality problems
and be susceptible to them. These include uninterruptible power
supplies, variable frequency drives, battery chargers, large
motors during startup, electronic dimming systems, lighting
ballasts, arc welders and other arc devices, and medical equipment.
In many cases, simply installing enhanced electrical systems
and better grounding systems will prevent the problem.
Many of the remedies for achieving good power qualities are
relatively inexpensive to install during construction or building
renovations. |
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