Piri Reis University

Faculty of Maritime – Department of Marine Engineering

SMME422-Marine Electrotechnology-II

POWER FACTOR

Power

Power may be defined as the rate of doing work or the rate of using energy. These two definitions
are equivalent since one unit of energy must be used to do one unit of work. Often it is convenient
to calculate the average power.

Work F cos avg

Pavg = --------- = -------------- This can be arranged in the form: Pavg = F cos  vavg.
time t

It turns out that this is a general form and that instantaneous power can be calculated from the
expression:
Pinstantaneous = F cos  v. This in vector notation is the scalar product:

In the straightforward cases where a constant force moves an object at constant velocity, the
power is just P= Fv. In a more general case where the velocity is not in the same direction as the
force, then the scalar product of force and velocity must be used.

The standard unit for power is the watt (abbreviated W) which is a joule per second.

Power Calculation

 A horsepower is equal to 550 ft lb/s

 A kilowatt is 1000 watts.
 1 hp = 745.8 watts.

This calculation is only for cases where the force is in the direction of the velocity, and there are
many cases where that is not so. Then for instantaneous power, you just multiply the product of
force and velocity by the cosine of the angle between them to get the power. In the more general
cases where everything varies, one often calculates the work first and then divides by the time to
get the average power.

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Piri Reis University
Faculty of Maritime – Department of Marine Engineering
SMME422-Marine Electrotechnology-II

DC Electric Power

The electric power in watts associated with a complete electric circuit or a circuit component
represents the rate at which energy is converted from the electrical energy of the moving charges
to some other form, e.g., heat, mechanical energy, or energy stored in electric fields or magnetic
fields.

Power Dissipated in Resistor

For a resistor in a D C Circuit the power is given by the product of applied voltage and the electric
current:

P = VI (Power = Voltage x Current)

Convenient expressions for the power dissipated in a resistor can be obtained by the use of Ohm's
Law.

These relationships are valid for AC applications also if the voltages and currents are rms or
effective values.

The resistor is a special case, and the AC power expression for the general case includes another
term called the power factor which accounts for phase differences between the voltage and
current. The fact that the power dissipated in a given resistance depends upon the square of the
current dictates that for high power applications you should minimize the current. This is the
rationale for transforming up to very high voltages for cross-country electric power distribution.

DC Power in Series and Parallel Circuits

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Piri Reis University
Faculty of Maritime – Department of Marine Engineering
SMME422-Marine Electrotechnology-II

The power relationship is one of the main tools for the analysis of electric circuits, along with
Ohm's Law, the voltage law and the current law. Applying the current law to the given circuits
along with Ohm's law and the rules for combining resistors gives the numbers shown below. The
determining of the voltages and currents associated with a particular circuit along with the power
allows you to completely describe the electrical state of a direct current circuit.

AC Electric Power

As in the case with DC power, the instantaneous electric power in an AC circuit is given by P =
VI, but these quantities are continuously varying. Almost always the desired power in an AC
circuit is the average power, which is given by Pavg = VI cosφ where φ is the phase angle
between the current and the voltage and where V and I are understood to be the effective or rms
values of the voltage and current. Cos φ: is the power factor for the circuit. For:

C = ………… μF and
L = ………… mH and
R = ………… ohms
 = …………. X 10 …………… rad/s
f = …………. X 10 ……………Hz = ……………kHz =
…………..MHz
Z = …………. X 10 ……………ohms at phase  =
…………… degrees
V = …………. volts (for an applied rms voltage)
Pavg= ………... VI cos  = ………...watts (AC power)
Cos  = ……... (power factor)

so the power is reduced to that fraction of what it would be in a DC circuit with the same voltage
and current.

Power Factor

For a DC circuit the power is P=VI and this relationship also holds for the instantaneous power in
an AC circuit.

However, the average power in an AC circuit expressed in terms of the rms voltage and current is
where is the phase angle between the voltage and current. The additional term is called the
power factor.

From the phasor diagram for AC impedance, it can be seen that the power factor is R/Z. For a
purely resistive AC circuit, R=Z and the power factor = 1.

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Piri Reis University
Faculty of Maritime – Department of Marine Engineering
SMME422-Marine Electrotechnology-II

Importance of Power Factor

A power factor of one or "unity power factor" is the goal of any electric utility company since if
the power factor is less than one, they have to supply more current to the user for a given amount
of power use. In so doing, they incur more line losses. They also must have larger capacity
equipment in place than would be otherwise necessary. As a result, an industrial facility will be
charged a penalty if its power factor is much different from 1.

Industrial facilities tend to have a "lagging power factor", where the current lags the voltage (like
an inductor). This is primarily the result of having a lot of electric induction motors - the windings
of motors act as inductors as seen by the power supply. Capacitors have the opposite effect and
can compensate for the inductive motor windings. Some industrial sites will have large banks of
capacitors strictly for the purpose of correcting the power factor back toward one to save on utility
company charges.

Phase

When capacitors or inductors are involved in an AC circuit, the current and voltage do not peak at
the same time. The fraction of a period difference between the peaks expressed in degrees is said
to be the phase difference. The phase difference is <= 90 degrees. It is customary to use the angle
by which the voltage leads the current. This leads to a positive phase for inductive circuits since
current lags the voltage in an inductive circuit. The phase is negative for a capacitive circuit since
the current leads the voltage. The useful mnemonic ELI the ICE man helps to remember the sign
of the phase. The phase relation is often depicted graphically in a phasor diagram.

Phasor Diagrams

It is sometimes helpful to treat the phase as if

it defined a vector in a plane. The usual
reference for zero phase is taken to be the
positive x-axis and is associated with the
resistor since the voltage and current
associated with the resistor are in phase. The
length of the phasor is proportional to the magnitude of the quantity represented, and its angle
represents its phase relative to that of the current through the resistor. The phasor diagram for the
RLC series circuit shows the main features.

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Piri Reis University
Faculty of Maritime – Department of Marine Engineering
SMME422-Marine Electrotechnology-II

Note that the phase angle, the difference in phase between the voltage and the current in an AC
circuit, is the phase angle associated with the impedance Z of the circuit.

If a mass on a rod is rotated at constant speed and the resulting circular path illuminated from the
edge, its shadow will trace out simple harmonic motion. If the shadow vertical position is traced as
a function of time, it will trace out a sine wave. A full period of the sine wave will correspond to a
complete circle or 360 degrees. The idea of phase follows this parallel, with any fraction of a
period related to the corresponding fraction of a circle in degrees.

Interference and Phase

Instantaneous Power

As in DC circuits, the instantaneous electric power in an AC

circuit is given by P=VI where V and I are the instantaneous
voltage and current. Since:

then the instantaneous power at any time t can be expressed as:

and using the trig identity: the power becomes:

Average Power

Normally the average power is the power of interest in AC circuits. Since the expression for the
instantaneous power:

is a continuously varying one with time, the average must be obtained by integration. Averaging
over one period T of the sinusoidal function will give the average power. The second term in the
power expression above averages to zero since it is an odd function of t. The average of the first
term is given by:

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Piri Reis University
Faculty of Maritime – Department of Marine Engineering
SMME422-Marine Electrotechnology-II

Since the rms voltage and current are given by and the average power can be expressed as Pavg =
VI cosφ

RMS and Effective Values

Circuit currents and voltages in AC circuits are generally stated as root-mean-square or rms values
rather than by quoting the maximum values. The root-mean-square for a current is defined by:

That is, you take the square of the current and average it, then take the square root. When this
process is carried out for a sinusoidal current

Since the AC voltage is also sinusoidal, the form of the rms voltage is the same. These rms values
are just the effective value needed in the expression for average power to put the AC power in the
same form as the expression for DC power in a resistor. In a resistor where the power factor is
equal to 1:

Since the voltage and current are both sinusoidal, the power expression can be expressed in terms
of the squares of sine or cosine functions, and the average of a sine or cosine squared over a whole
period is = 1/2.

Average Power Integral

Finding the value of the average power for sinusoidal voltages involves the integral:

The period T of the sinusoid is related to the angular frequency ω and angle θ by:

Using these relationships, the integral above can be recast in the form: Which can be shown using
the trig identity:

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Piri Reis University
Faculty of Maritime – Department of Marine Engineering
SMME422-Marine Electrotechnology-II

which reduces the integral to the value 1/2 since the second term on the right has an integral of
zero over the full period.