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Calculating Max. Demand Kilovolt-Amperes and Required Cable


Current Rating
A building site and electrical equipment
A building site is to have the following electrical equipment available for use:
Tower crane, electric motors totalling 75 kW at 415 V;
Sump pump, 5 kW at 240 V;
60 tungsten lamps of 100 W each at 240 V;
12 flood lamps of 400 W each at 240 V;
20 hand tools of 400 W at 110 V.
To calculate //
1. Find the total kilovolt-amperes to be supplied to the site if the power factor of all rotary equipment is 0.8.
2. Find the electrical current rating for the incoming supply cable to the site.
3. Estimate the cost of electricity consumed on the site during a 12-month contract.

Ok, lets do it
For rotating machinery, formulae for power in Volt Amperes [VA] goes like this:
For single-phase current:
For three-phase current:
The results of the power calculations are given in
Table 1 below. The answers required are as follows.
1. The total input power kilovolt-amperes required for site is 120.8 kVA
2. The incoming supply cable capacity at 415 volt, three-phase, 50 Hz required is:
This is the input current to the site at the voltage of that cable. This is not the same as
a total of the currents calculated in Table 1 as these larger numbers only appear
at their reduced voltages in the relevant sub-circuits.
3. Assume that the crane, pump and tools are running for 25% of an 8-h working
day, 5 days per week for 48 weeks, 20 of the tungsten lamps are for security
lighting 16 h every night, and the remaining 40 tungsten lamps and the flood lamps
are used for 3 h per day, 5 days per week for the winter period of 20 weeks.
The crane, pump and tools are working for:
The security lamps are working for:
The other lamps are working for:

Table 1 Building site plant schedule


Equipment

Power
(kW)

Number

kW

kVA

Tower
Crane

75

75

93.75

415

130.4

Sump Pump

6.25

240

26

Lamps

0.1

60

240

25

Flood
Lamps

0.4

12

4.8

4.8

240

20

Hand Tools

0.4

20

10

110

90.9

98.8

120.8

n.a.

n.a.

Total //

Table 2 Building site energy use


Equipment

Power (kW)

Number

Time (h)

Energy (kWh)

Tower Crane

75

480

36000

Sump Pump

480

2400

Tungsten lamps, security Lamps

0.1

20

5824

11648

Lamps

0.1

40

300

1200

Flood Lamps

0.4

12

300

1440

Hand Tools

0.4

20

480

3840

Total Power Used //

56528

The total energy used by the systems is found from:


kWh = number of appliances kW per appliance operation hours as shown in Table 2.
If electricity costs 8 p per unit (kWh) then the estimated cost for the 1-year contract will be:
Reference: Building Services Engineering // Electrical Installations
David V. Chadderton (Purchase paperback from Amazon)

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