Minimizing the Penalty in Industrial Sector by Engaging the Automatic Power Factor Correction Panel using Microcontroller

Abstract

In the industrial sector the various motoring loads are continuously running and generating the inductive load. So the power factor in this system gets reduced due to the inductive reactive power. But the electricity board has a standard limits regarding the power factor values and if the power factor goes below the specified limit; the electricity company charges the penalty to the industrial consumers. The automatic power factor correction panel provides the required compensation to overcome the inductive reactance by using the power capacitors. The microcontroller 8051 receives current signal from current transformer and simultaneously gives the signals to the various contactors to connect the capacitors in the line for the compensation. Thus by adding the capacitor to the line will compensate the reactive power and maintains the power factor near to unity. This will avoids the penalty to the industrial consumers and may get the incentives. In the conventional methods we were using the fixed capacitor for compensation. But these were leading to excessive charging of the capacitors causes the voltage surges. Thus it becomes difficult to main power factor near unity by on and off operation of fixed capacitor. The contactor switched capacitors are connected and disconnected automatically eliminating the previous problem.