A REPORT ON POWER FACTOR CORRECTION AND ITS EFFECT

USING

CAPACITOR BANK
THE THEORY
Power Factor correction (PFC) is applied to electric circuits as a means of minimizing the inductive
component of the current and thereby reducing the losses in the supply.
The introduction of Power Factor Correction capacitors is a widely recognized method of reducing an
electrical load, thus minimizing wasted energy and hence improving the efficiency of a plant and
reducing the electricity bill.
It is not usually necessary to reach unity, ie Power Factor 1, since most supply companies are happy
with a PF of 0.95 to 0.98

Power Factor is a measure of how efficiently electrical power is consumed. In the ideal world
Power Factor would be unity (or 1). Unfortunately in the real world Power Factor is reduced by
highly inductive loads to 0.7 or less. This induction is caused by equipment such as lightly
loaded electric motors, luminaire transformers and fluorescent lighting ballasts and welding sets,
etc
Power factor is also the percentage of electricity that is being used to do useful work.

The higher the current flowing through the equipment or conductors, the lower the power factor.
Power factor =Active power/Apparent power.

Apparent power has two component:

(a) Active power
(b) Reactive power

DEFINATION p
1.ACTIVE POWER: Active power does all the work.
UNIT: kw
P= v I cos

2. REACTIVE POWER: I t is the pseudo power (false) power which flows from source to load during
+ve half and load to source during a half cycle.
UNIT: Kvar
Q= v I sin