EXPERIMENTAL RIG FOR TESTING VOLTAGE OPTIMISER
EXPERIMENTAL RIG FOR TESTING VOLTAGE OPTIMISER
Hao Liu, PhD Student, Oleh Kiselychnyk, PhD, Research Fellow, Jihong Wang, PhD, Professor
In the UK, almost all domestic appliances are designed to work under the voltage at 220~230V. However, the voltage distributed to individual homes is normally above 230V due to the transmission and distribution. In some places near substation, the mains voltage is even higher than 240V. The overrated voltage level not only reduces the life time of the appliances but also increases the power consumption of the appliances. Hence, a new technology called voltage optimisation (VO) comes into practice to overcome this voltage issues. The basic principle is to apply different circuitry with transformer to control and optimise the voltage level. By adopting this technology, it is claimed that the power consumption of the whole house can be saved and the electricity bill is therefore reduced. Massive home owners’ surveys are conducted to investigate the exact saving; however this approach tends to be time-consuming and not cost-effective. In this research, test rig and load bank are set up to estimate power reduction to avoid expensive surveys cost through laboratory experiments.
