UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

Written By
Ir. Tan Yoke Lee
MIEM, Mi-FIRE E
yokeleetan71@gmail.com
Reference materials and images credit to : Yaskawa Youtube on Harmonics
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

What is harmonics?

• AC current is in the form of sine waves with phase

shift. The waves have 2 characteristics namely the
amplitude of the waves and the frequency.
Amplitude is defined as the magnitude of the
waves and frequency is the number of complete
cycles of the waves in one second.

• It is distortion of current and voltage waves such

that they are no longer sinusoidal.
One cycle
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

How are harmonics then created?

When the load is linear as below, there is no distortion of the sine waves. So both current and voltage are in the
shapes of sine waves.

However when non linear loads such as LED lights, DC chargers for handphones and computers, AC/DC inverters,
VSD drives are connected, the current wave forms are distorted.
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

Why are harmonics destructive?

• Harmonics are undesirable as they can

cause line losses, equipment damage,
increased cost to supply power and
wasted energy.

• The main damage of harmonics is the

heating effect of current distortion.
Thus cables, motors, gensets and
transformers may get heated up.
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

The current value at each point of time can be defined as sum of the fundamental current and harmonics
current. A 3rd harmonic would have the frequency 3 x the fundamental frequency.

The bigger the amplitude of the harmonics current relative to fundamental, the bigger the distortion.
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

Note that in a balanced system such as motor, triplen harmonics are absent. And in an AC system, even harmonics
are absent.

Thus in balanced motor vsd, we need only consider 5th, 7th, 11th, 13th, 17th, 19th, etc.
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

Harmonics can be measured as follows:-

The total demand distortion is an average

value of THD over a period of 15 to 30 mins
and are often measured at site to check on
health of the network.
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

The responsibility of the customers are to reduce

the total current demand distortion (TDD) generated
by them.

They must comply to IEEE STD519 standard to

ensure that each of the harmonic distortion
amplitude is less than specified in table and the total
demand distortion is lower than specified in last
column.

The larger the source short circuit capacity relative

to the load current, the more is the distortion
allowed. However, increasing the short circuit
capacity of the source is a very expensive exercise
and thus other methods of harmonics mitigation are
carried out.
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

Total harmonic distortion for individual equipment

should generally not exceed 10% to keep
equipment and cabling in tact.

Say for 10% current distortion, Irms = I1 x sqrt(1+1) = 1.4 I1

Thus, the cable sizing with harmonics is bigger as we normally size motor cable to 1.25 x fundamental current.
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

• Harmonics distortion causes the component distortion

power which will add to the total power distortion. This
will result in an increase in the power factor angle, thus
less true power is available as compared to total power.

• However, at present, the electricity supply provider in

Malaysia does not impose any penalty specifically for
harmonics distortion. However, there is a charge for
low power factor. It is noted that harmonics can create
low power factor as shown in the diagram. So penalty
for creating harmonics distortion is indirect.
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

The responsibility of the system owner or operator is

to maintain the allowable voltage distortion at the
point of common coupling.
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

Thus harmonics need to be mitigated. The few common methods of mitigations are:-

1. Installing DC link choke

2. Installing DC link choke and AC line reactor
3. Installing higher pulse drives.
4. Installing active front end filter which uses IGBT fast switching gates.
UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

Thus harmonics need to be mitigated. The few common methods of mitigations are:-

• Installing DC link choke which is cheap.

UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

Thus harmonics need to be mitigated. The few common methods of mitigations are:-

• Installing DC link choke and AC line reactor which is cheap.

UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

Installing higher pulse drives to mitigate harmonics amplitude. Most drives if not specified the pulse will have 6 pulse.

For example, in 18 pulse drives, 5th ,

7th, 11th, 13th harmonics are
missing. These harmonics have
higher amplitude, thus the
harmonics distortion can be
reduced.

This is a more expensive solution.

UNDERSTANDING HARMONICS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A MECHANICAL ENGINEER

In conclusion

1. Harmonics are created by non linear load.

2. Non linear load creates distortion in current which can be expressed as combination of fundamental current and
harmonics current.

3. Excessive harmonics current will reduce capacity of transformer and genset. It also heats up equipment and
cable. Energy is wasted in terms of heat generated.

4. Thus harmonics should be mitigated where possible at source such as vsd drives. Drives with higher pulse will
have smaller harmonics distortion. Cheaper method will be by installing DC line choke and AC reactor.