I have a customer that wants information on saving energy and making the most of the efficiency of there motors. Does anyone have information as to where I can get information on motor efficiency and variable speed drives etc. Cost savings and how to calculate etc to make this fly I am going to have to show them the money and how to do it.

Craig

Craig:

The US Department of Energy has put together everything from best practices to the MotorMaster Plus software to assist you in these very things. All the material is free (except the ASD Master - Variable Frequency Drive software, because it is owned by EPRI, the Electric Power Research Institute).

The link to the site is:

http://www1.eere.energy.gov/industry/

And select any of the topics. They include motors, fans, pumps, compressors, process heating, steam and other tools, as well.

Sincerely,
Howard

I'd say it's a pretty broad subject. In general, applications which benefit from VFD are ones that waste a lot of energy throttling flow.

A simple savings calculator for various applications is here:
http://alliantenergy.com/docs/groups/public/documents/pub/p010794.hcsp

Contact a sales rep for vfd's (Danfoss, ABB etc) and I'll bet they'd would love the opportunity to help you analyse your specific application and put together the business justification.

Thank you Both very much, I will start researching this now that I have a few places to start. Most of what I am refering to is the compressor and pump motors that could use some energy saving techniques.

Craig