I am designing a system for railway that consumes roughly 1kW from public mains power, and I am having trouble fining the relevant standards that it should fulfill. The main market will be Europe, but in the future it might go as well to the USA, asia or elsewhere.

So far I found that according to IEC 61000-2-3:2014 the device either should comply with generic conditions from clause 6.2.1 (or if it does not meet this then user should ask the supply utility for permission to connect it, but that is not desirable)
What I cannot find, is any mention of the limits for power factor. Is there some other standard that I am missing?

Also, does anyone know how is the situation in the USA and elsewhere in the world?

 

That's lower than a standard residential kilowatt-hour avg. by a pretty big margin, and utilities don't bother with PF for residential units.
I don't think 1 kw of poor power factor is going to get the utilities attention at all.

 

Yes it is not a big load, however it is not a residential use and I would rather be sure if there are some limits, than find out a year later after during assesment that the system doesn't comply with some standard.

 

Yes it is not a big load, however it is not a residential use and I would rather be sure if there are some limits, than find out a year later after during assesment that the system doesn't comply with some standard.

Contact the utility for definitive information re. the limits.

 

The problem is that that would involve conatcting all utilities in the whole Europe, which is kind of impractical. That's why I am asking if anyone knows the applicable standard.

 

The problem is that that would involve conatcting all utilities in the whole Europe, which is kind of impractical. That's why I am asking if anyone knows the applicable standard.

You misunderstand, methinks.

If all of the utilities in the USE are grid tied and if harmony has been achieved, an inquiry to any station will yield an answer applicable to all, which will be the standard you're looking for.

 

Typically even in a commercial applications they don't care about PF until you start getting into the 100's of KVA and higher continuous load range.

Below that their own systems inherent PF issues are of more of a concern.

 

Typically even in a commercial applications they don't care about PF until you start getting into the 100's of KVA and higher continuous load range.

Do you have a reference to prove your point?

Below that their own systems inherent PF issues are of more of a concern.

 

Yes. A proper internet search will give you loads of information on what standards and points of power usage that need PF correction become valid.

 

Yes it is not a big load, however it is not a residential use and I would rather be sure if there are some limits, than find out a year later after during assesment that the system doesn't comply with some standard.

If the place of application has any electrical motors of any kind and they are not required to have PF correction you probably don't need it either.

Maybe 1 KVA seems big in electronics terms but in general electrical power systems terms it's a gain of dust in a gravel pit.

 

The place of application is somewhere along a railway track, and could be in the middle of a city or could be kilometers away from civilization, and as I said any location along the track in europe or in the near future in the rest of the world could be it.
The thing is that I cannot just rely on my judgement as in "it will be ok, everyone does that", if such regulation exists then I have to be compliant. And beacuse of that I would love to prevent this coming back and biting me in the rear some years from now, and just find out if there are general requirements for this kind of installation.

And after a few hours of searching I couldn´t find any regulation that would say you need PF better that x%, so I am pretty confident this should not concern this case, but still I am asking just to find out if someone else has a better and firmer grasp on this.

 

Yes. A proper internet search will give you loads of information on what standards and points of power usage that need PF correction become valid.

So you have no quotable reference?

 

If the place of application has any electrical motors of any kind and they are not required to have PF correction you probably don't need it either.

Maybe 1 KVA seems big in electronics terms but in general electrical power systems terms it's a gain of dust in a gravel pit.

Regardless of the scale of magnitude, as I understand it the question wasn't about the place of the application's individual reactive loads, it was about about the utility's requirements that those reactive loads be rendered resistive in order to bring KVA closer to KW in order to avoid waste.

 

So you have no quotable reference?

Yes I do but given how easily I found them online you can do the same.

as I understand it the question wasn't about the place of the application's individual reactive loads,

Hmm.

The place of application is somewhere along a railway track, and could be in the middle of a city or could be kilometers away from civilization, and as I said any location along the track in europe or in the near future in the rest of the world could be it.

Seems place/s of application is pretty well defined and relevant as I read it.

it was about about the utility's requirements that those reactive loads be rendered resistive in order to bring KVA closer to KW in order to avoid waste.

Agian magnitude of 'waste' has everything to do with the practicality things. A aluminum foil wrapper from a piece of gum is just as recyclable as a 25 ton truckload of them. Problem in reality is one's not worth the effort, financially or otherwise, to recycle and one is due to its magnitude of recycling and waste avoidance value.

 

Yes I do but given how easily I found them online you can do the same.

So would you be so kind and show what you found or how to find it, as I didn´t find anything specific, only a few vague numbers for some countries in southern america..

 

Almost every country has a desired min. Usually 95% lagging.
But varies from 90 to 98% for most.

USA, EUROPE and JAPAN currently refer to EN61000-3-2

 

USA, EUROPE and JAPAN currently refer to EN61000-3-2

That´s the problem, there is no mention of any limit on PF in that standard. PF is only used in calculation of THD limits for class C devices, but my device is class A so there is only limits on THD.

 

Then make sure you are within the limits set for odd order harmonics and have a brew.

 

So would you be so kind and show what you found or how to find it, as I didn´t find anything specific, only a few vague numbers for some countries in southern america..

Only if you explain what your device does and costs plus what its power factor is and how much correcting it would cost and why and what the realistic ROI for having done so works out to.

If it all adds up to be a justifiable concern to begin with sure. However if this ends up being a $1000+ device that can have its power factor corrected to within .85 or higher with a common <$20 PF correction capacitor and for it shows a theoretical ROI timeline of more than 10 years, probably not.

http://powerelectronics.com/power-management/power-factor-correction-justified-home

To be honest the reason you are not finding anything definitive for small scale load issues is because they are of no real concern and when PF correction should be considered for an application is typically set by the individual utility company at every location. So one company may see that anything over 100 KVA with a PF under .75 requires correction on the customers side whereas at another they might have a better built and maintained systems and not have care in the world until the customer starts regularly dropping below .6 PF and running at the MVA and higher power level.

Simply put just because the site ownership is a commercial business that itself does not mean the utility company considers that site a commercial power consumer (or at least not a high power consuming one) who needs to meet any degree of PF requirements being from the utility companies perspective their own transformer feeding the site likely makes the site PF far lower than anything its powering ever will the vast majority of the time.

I'm guessing your device goes in those little railway utility sheds/buildings which likely don't have nor need much more than a common light load type 5 - 10 KVA electrical service to begin with?