The slip power recovery system is relevant to large induction motors using slip rings on the rotor for

speed control. The speed control is by varying the resistance across the slip rings. The energy in this large resistor is wasted as heat. One example of such motor use is in steel rolling mills. With slip recovery, the power generated in the rotor by induction motor action is taken from the slip rings, and rectified and inverted to be fed back to the motor supply. By using electronic control the energy drawn from the rotor is balanced against the needs of the load and and regulates the RPM. It behaves like a finely controlled speed control resistor/s. Instead of wasting the energy as heat it is fed back to the power supply (recovered). Note that the power from the rotor is AC at a low frequency according to the slip ratio, generated by a "rotary transformer" type of action. The slip ratio is the difference between operating speed and synchronous speed. The energy in the rotor is only a small percentage of the total power, so is most relevant in very large motors. Using this electronic form of speed control allows added features to be added to existing or new large motors, including energy recovery, tighter speed control, and an ability to skip past mechanical resonances in the motor during speed changes. Smoother operation leads to less wear and tear on the motor. The first link shows a brochure fo such a system. The second link shows an analysis for induction motors, with equivalent circuits. The slip recovery system works on replacing rotor resistance with an external resistance where some of the energy is recovered, instead of being dissipated. Otherwise it is just an electronically controlled resistance that replaces rotor resistance in this analysis (equivalent circuit). The calculations for a 25hp motor near the end of the document (equations 9 and 10) show that the power transferred across the air gap to the rotor is 22KW (most of it output power) and the rotor copper loss is only 440W, so that gives some idea of the energy available for recovery, and why it is more likely only a big motor makes it worth while. It is only 2% in this case. The actual energy recovered depends on the motor design, operation etc..