A Study on Energy Saving Rate for Variable Speed Condition of Multistage Centrifugal Pump

Abstract

Centrifugal pumps are being widely used in many industrial and commercial applications. Many of these pumps are being operated at constant speed but could provide energy savings through adjustable speed operations. The purpose of this study was to get the energy saving rates of the multistage centrifugal pump with variable speed conditions. For this investigation an experimental set up of variable flow and pressure system was made to get energy saving rates and numerical analyses are applied to validate the pump performance. The energy saving and therefore the cost saving depends on the specific duty cycle of which the machine operates. Duty cycle is the proportion of time during which a component, device and system is operated. The duty cycle segmented into different flow rates and weighting the average value for each segment by the interval time. The system was operated at 50% or less of the pump capacity. The input power of the system was carried out by pump characteristics curve of each operating point. The energy consumption was done by the product of specific duty cycle and the input power of the system for constant speed and variable speed drive operation. The total energy consumed for constant speed drive pump was 75,770 kW.hr and for variable speed drive pump was 31,700 kW.hr. The total energy saving of the system was 44,070 kW.hr or 58.16% annually. So, this paper suggests a method of implementing an energy saving on variable-flow and pressure system of the multistage centrifugal pump.