Courtesy: http://premium.thehindubusinessline.

com/portfolio/firm-calls/cummins-
india/article9550685.ece

Electrical Systems for

Chemical and Mechanical
Engineers
Published on Published onOctober 12, 2017

Upstream Process Engineer, Chartered Chemical

Engineer (M.E, CEng, MIChemE)
22 articles

Like 51
 Comment 5
4

As I look back in time, I reminded of what a swaggering little fresh

postgraduate chemical engineer I was, until I was left in the lurch due to
a dearth of practical Industrial know-how. A few months into my job
and I realized that, irrespective of ones core qualification, it is necessary
to grasp some knowledge of other ancillary disciplines because no one
branch of engineering caters to all the industrial needs. For a start, it is
imperative for chemical and mechanical engineers to arm themselves
with some knowledge of electrical systems and machinery.

One of the day-in-day-out job of a chemical or mechanical design

engineer in the engineering industry is to estimate the power
requirements of an electrical motor. Although this might suffice with a
an electrical engineer around to work out the remaining requirements,
there is no harm, rather, beneficial for Engineers to go the extra mile in
gaining experience in assessing and selecting electrical equipment.

Drivers for Rotating Equipment

The two most common types of rotating equipment in the oil & gas
industry are centrifugal compressors, centrifugal pumps. Although
traditionally gas turbines have catered to running centrifugal
compressors, Electrical Motors have also equally found their way into
meeting demands as a prime mover. In locations where surplus power is
available, electrical motors are a good alternative, offer much better
efficiency than gas turbines and are a better bet due to lower
maintenance headaches.
Asynchronous Induction Motor
Asynchronous Induction motors are popular in process industries partly
due to their simple design, ruggedness and low maintenance.

A 3-Phase asynchronous induction motor design consists of a rotor and a

stator surrounded by copper coils which induces a magnetic field (hence
the name induction) on the rotor causing the rotor to rotate. The chief
parameters used to determine the speed of a given induction motor is the
AC current frequency and the 'number of poles' around which the
copper coils is wound. Copper coils have high electrical conductivity
and hence higher efficiency although sometimes aluminium is used
because of its lightweight properties and is less expensive. Using these
parameters, the synchronous speed of a motor (i.e., the speed at which
the magnetic field rotates and acts on the rotor) is calculated as follows,

The term Ns represents the synchronous speed (measured as

revolutions per minute or rpm), f represents the current frequency
and 'P' represents the number of poles. In a 3-Phase Induction motor,
three alternating current (AC) lines pass through that stator side with a
phase difference of 120 degrees and produce a magnetic field.

Theoretically, if the magnetic field is produced to run at a certain speed

(say 3000 rpm), the rotor should also rotate at the same speed. But
practically, this would not be the case, since the rotor shaft is connected
to a load. The rotor speed tends to lag behind in picking up the magnetic
fields rotational effects thereby causing the rotor to rotate at a slightly
lower speed compared to the synchronous speed. This lag is known as
Slip. Slip percentages are about 1% to 2% at full load but during startup
and can even reach 4% to 5%. Motors are also associated with the term
Torque which represents the turning effect of force.

An induction motor with a higher torque means higher capacity to overcome the
inertia of a system and get it kick started from a state of rest.

In simple terms, for a given power capacity of an asynchronous

induction motor, with higher torque, you get less speed and vice versa. If
higher speeds and torque is required, a higher powered motor is needed.

It must be remembered that a motor with higher number of poles are

bulkier and are more expensive. Therefore a 2 pole or a 4 pole motor is
preferred. Below is a table that summarizes the different synchronous
speeds of a 3-phase, 50 Hz induction motor and what they imply.
Induction Motor Characteristics
Besides the mechanical construction, an asynchronous induction motor
is characterized by Speed vs. Torque Curves which is necessary to
choose a motor for a given application. Below is an image that depicts a
speed vs. torque curves and what they represent.
On a serious note, the following terminologies are employed to explain
the various types of torque,

1. Starting Torque: The amount of torque required to overcome the

inertia of a standstill.
2. Pull-Up Torque: The minimum torque generated by a motor as it
accelerates from standstill to operating speed.
3. Break Down Torque: The maximum torque that the motor is
capable of developing.
4. Full Load Torque: The torque required to produce the rated
power of an electrical motor at full-load speed.
5. Rated Torque: The maximum continuous torque available at the
design speed that allows the motor to do the work without
overheating.
6. Full Load Speed: Synchronous Speed - Slip%

The image also depicts that

1. When the motor starts up, the alternating current drawn through
the stator side initially is very high and subsides only after crossing
the breakdown torque.
2. As the load on the motor increases, speed decreases while the
current absorbed increases.
3. In case the load increases to an exceptionally high value and the
motor cannot overcome the system inertia to bring the compressor
to running condition, it causes a deceleration of speed and
subsequently increases the drawn-in current. In such a case, where
the drawn-in currents are high and the motor speed is not enough,
 the motor coils can be expected to overheat and to turn into a
cauldron of Spaghetti.

National Electrical Manufacturers Association

(NEMA)

The National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA) is an

organization that sets the standards for manufacturing of electrical
equipment. In the case of electrical induction motors, NEMA sets 4
types of Torque vs Speed Characteristics namely, NEMA A, NEMA B,
NEMA C and NEMA D. The characteristics of the different types of
NEMA curves are explained below.
Among these, NEMA A and NEMA B are most commonly used due to
their high breakdown characteristics and low slip (1% to 5%).

A Case Study: Induction Motor for an Air

Compressor
Imagine that you have to estimate the power requirements of an 500
ACFM (Actual cubic feet/min) Air Compressor that has to draw air from
the ambient atmosphere at 25 deg.C at 2 bar(a) and compress it to 6
bar(a). To begin with, the following assumptions are made. The Torque
vs. Speed Curves shown in the previous section can be taken as the
motor characteristics for the computations.

Assumptions

1. The compressor is assumed to run at its best polytropic efficiency

point of 85% and a total mechanical efficiency of 80%.
 2. The pressures at which the compressor is operated is low and
hence the compressibility factor (Z) and Cp/Cv of the gas is not
expected to change much and Cp/Cv can taken to be 1.4.
3. The Instrument air system has the necessary equipment to meet
specifications stated in the ANSI/ISA 7.0.01 Quality Standard
for Instrument Air.

What is the power requirement of the Air

Compressor??
Calculation Steps

1. Calculate the polytropic exponent using specific heat ratio [Cp/Cv

=k] and polytropic exponent [n].
2. Calculate the polytropic head [Hp] that needs to be developed by
the air compressor i.e, how much energy is required to compress 1
kg of air from the initial condition of 2 bar(a) to 6 bar(a).
3. Calculate the power requirements by multiplying the polytropic
head [Hp] by the mass flow followed by taking into account the
polytropic efficiency and mechanical efficiency.
The above steps are used in an MS-Excel Sheet and it is seen that the
power required is about 92 kW (or ~124 HP).

The torque and power are related by the basic equation as follows,
Based on the horsepower calculation in the above case study, if a 3-
Phase, 50Hz, 4 pole squirrel cage induction motor is selected the torque
required to sustain the compressor at rated conditions of 6 bar(a) and
500 ACFM during running conditions of the air compressor at a full load
speed of 1470 rpm would be about,

The breakdown torque at 185% torque (ie., at 97% of full load speed)
from the torque vs. Speed grpah in the previous section is calculated as,

Selection of Induction Motor Capacity

The ideal case of selecting the induction motor is to ensure that the operating
point of the electric motor is between 80% to 85% of the motor's full load torque
(i.e., 100% Torque line).

Based on the case study, as per NEMA standards for a 4 pole, 50 Hz,
polyphase, squirrel cage induction motor, either a 125 HP (93 kW)
motor or a 150 HP with a breakdown torque of 200% motor can be
selected.
Choosing the 125 HP motor for the running case of 124 HP would mean
that the motor is running in a neck to neck situation of 124 HP / 125 HP
= ~99.2% of the motor's full load torque. Besides, the calculation made
above does not take into account the compressor rotor and gas loads on
the motor and therefore could cause the 125 HP motor to struggle to help
reach the compressor's rated conditions of 6 bar(a).

Therefore it is more prudent to choose a 150 HP motor which offers a

margin. In the case study made, the maximum torque that can be
provided by the 150 HP induction electric motor at break down
conditions is calculated at the breakdown torques corresponding speed.
The breakdown torque at 200% for the selected 150 HP (~112 kW)
motor (ie., at 97% of full load speed) is calculated as,

It is to be noted that although the breakdown torque is higher for a 150

HP induction motor, when the air compressor reaches the full load speed
of 1470 rpm, the torque required would be at 124 HP / 150 HP, i.e., at
~83% of the full load torque (100% torque line) which satisfies the 80%
to 85% of the full load torque condition.

Cautionary Note
Selecting an extremely powerful induction motor for a given compressor
system can cause short startup times. This means the anti-surge valve
also has to respond fast enough to recycle cold gas through the anti surge
valve (ASV) of the compressor to avoid a high head at low flow
situation, i.e., a surge during a compressor startup. Hence for the motor
selected, a process dynamic simulation is always advisable to understand
the induction motor's effect on the compressor behaviour and ensure that
the right torque vs. speed curves and motor power have been selected.

------------------------------

References: [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12]

------------------------------

The Author indicates that in the present article, due to absence of

process and electrical data, numbers were assumed to prepare
electric motor characteristic curves. Hence the input data
presented here is chosen only for illustration purposes.