Blog Post 10/10 – Which Pieces of Infrastructure Data are Most Valuable?
What pieces of infrastructure data are the most valuable?
That’s the question that we tackle in this session. To begin with, in infrastructure, there a a number of data points available. However, the value of the data points can be obscured by a vendor when there are significant duplications of data being reported. For example. A set of valuable data points for cooling units which we have found in practice looks like this:
- amperage of each phase
- voltage of each phase
- power factor of each phase
- wattage of each phase
- kWh energy of each phase
- supply temperature
- return temperature
- Delta T
- supply humidity
- return humidity
- Delta H
- air flow in cfm
- BTU’s removed in real time
- Watts removed in real time
- Coefficient of Performance (COP) Wattage of Heat removed divided by Wattage of Power used
- Predictive Failure Analysis – Power Balance of the Phases to spot Motor Horse Power derating and potential failure
This list comes to 16 data points which many see as a great advantage over what they are presently receiving. Often, vendors describe their full list of 50 data points of information for even 100 points of information. But, if half of those are simply different temperature (low alarm, low-low alarm, high- alarm, high-high alarm, etc.) then its value gets obscured. Any system can provide alarming but, without the right data, no alarm is valuable.
Further, as you can see from the above list gives, you get to look at the COP to compare each cooling unit vs. all others. COP is a measurement that has been around for years but, has not been widely used. Perhaps this is because it has traditionally been too expensive to get the data necessary to calculate COP in real-time. Fortunately, this situation has now changed and getting this list of data points in real-time allows the user to list all cooling units from best performing to worst performing. Then, by combining this with the Delta T and air flow information, you can then spot units that are simply not needed or are candidates for a Variable Frequency Drive (VFD). VFD’s are not the panacea that many had hoped for and the reason is simple: you have to find the proper individual cooling unit candidates before deciding which should have a VFD. If you need between 90% – 100% of your rated air flow all the time, its simply not economical to purchase and install one of these variable flow devices.
This data will also show you if one of your units is a low performer because it has an electrical problems. The Department of Energy recently published a report with this surprising statement:
Voltage unbalance is probably the leading power quality problem that results in motor overheating and premature motor failure. Simply put, if your voltage, amperage or power factor is out of balance on the phases of your cooling system motor, you have a failure in the making. Unless you know the full spectrum of power data for each unit, you will not likely see this until its too late.
We will stop there for this blog session and I look forward to seeing you back in 2 weeks to look at the most valuable data points for power infrastructure.
Bob