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Active Power, Reactive Power,

Apparent Power, Power Factor & Power
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ANKIT KUMAR SINGH MARINE ELECTROTECHNOLOGY, MARINE ENGINEERING

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AC system is used at ship due to various advantages over DC system.

Major electrical Services at ship are Motor, Lighting & Heating.

Electrical power of AC system has 2 components: Active Power & Reactive Power

(Electrical power is nothing but the ow of electrical energy.)

Electrical Power Consumer

Resistor: It consumes Real power (Active Power) and dissipates in the form of
heat and light energy.

Inductor: It consumes Reactive power and dissipates in the form of magnetic

eld

Capacitor: It consumes Reactive power and dissipates in the form of electrostatic

eld.

 
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Assume a circuit with a resistor (R), voltage (V) and current ow (I). Waveforms of
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voltage and current are in phase and power waveform (by multiplying voltage and
current) is positive always i.e. (-) V and (-) I gives (+) Power. It means power ow is
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always (+) positive and power is taken from the supply and converted by the resistor
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into a power output. This power is nothing but Active Power.

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In DC system, there NOW power, so its unit is Kw or W. Simply, (1 V) . (1 A) = 1
is only active
W.

Active power is the power loss across resistance. More accurately, It is the power loss
across reactance, where Reactance = (Inductance + Resistance). It’s the actual power
which is really transferred to the load. 
 

Reactive Power

It represents that the energy is rst stored and then released in the form of
magnetic eld or electrostatic eld in case of inductor or capacitor.

Assume an inductor in a circuit, single phase AC supply of V volts, current ow is I,

then waveforms of voltage and current are at 90 degree to each other. Power
waveform is (+) positive as well as (-) negative i.e. not always positive like resistive
circuit.

It’s the power that continuously bounce back and forth between load and source.
Power absorbed and returned in load due to its reactive properties and hence
named as reactive power. It’s also called as useless power or watt-less power. It’s unit
is volt-ampere-reactive (VAR) or simply 1 VAR = (1 V) . (1 A).

Total Power or Apparent Power

It’s a total power in an AC circuit, both dissipated and absorbed or returned to as

apparent power. It’s vector summation of active power and reactive power and
denoted by the unit VA (volt-ampere). This the product of rms voltage and rms
current or the product of voltage and current without phase angle.

 
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Electrical Power in Single Phase & Three Phase System
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Active Power (P) = VI Cos φ
mentor ship in Merchant NavyActive Power (P) = √3 VI Cos φ
Reactive Power (Q) = VI Sin φ Reactive Power (Q) = √3 VI Sin φ
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Apparent Power (S) = VI Apparent Power (S) = √3 VI

Power Factor = Cos φ Power Factor = Cos φ

  
Understanding the relationship of active power, reactive power & apparent power:

Power Triangle

It’s a representation of relationship between active power, reactive power and

apparent power by a right angle triangle. It’s a vector (graphical) representation of
electrical power. Here real power is horizontal component, reactive power is vertical
component and apparent power is hypotenuse component in a right angle triangle.

Now, (Apparent Power)² = (Real Power)² + (Reactive Power)²

Beer Analogy

Relationship between active power, reactive power and total power can be easily
understood by beer mug analogy. Here if we put beer in a beer mug then actual
quantity of beer is like active power, foam in mug is like reactive power and total
beer in mug I.e. nothing but (actual quantity + foam) is like total power.

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Here only actual quantity will full ll your demand i.e. thirst not foam. In the same

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manner, only active power full ll the requirement not reactive power.

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Chips Packet Analogy

Same relationship can be understood with chips packet analogy also. Here actual
chips present in the packet is like active power (useful), empty or air in the packet is

like reactive power (useless) and total capacity (full packet) is like total power.
Concept of Power Factor

When these three terms (active power, reactive power & apparent power) comes
into picture then there is introduction of another term called Power Factor. Actually
all loads consume both reactive power as well as active power. But they should
consume active power ideally. So for improving the performance of equipment, we
have to improve power factor.

Power factor signi es the amount of active power (useful power) i.e. power available
out of the total power. For example, if p.f = 0.8 then it means 80% of total power
consumed is active power (real power). It’s a measure of how ef ciently electrical
power is converted into useful work output.

Power Factor = (Active Power)/(Total Power) = KW/KVA, where KVA = KW + KVAR.

Also, Cosine of angle between current and voltage is called power factor. Ratio
between resistance and impedance is also called power factor. Ratio of active power
and apparent power is called power factor.

Power Factor

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It represents that load is Inductive and draws only Reactive
power. Active power = 0

1
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It represents that load is Resistive and draws only Active power.

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Active power = Apparent power

It represents that load is load is generating power i.e. sources is

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generator. Active power = (-) Apparent power
-1
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Importance of Power Factor

Power factor must be closer to 1 i.e. total power must be almost equal to active

power to achieve following:
 Higher reactive power means higher electrical utilization or higher ef ciency of
machine.
Low energy consumption so that lower expenses on electricity, reduction in heat
losses in transformers, motors etc. and stabilization of voltage.

Here, we can improve power factor to achieve the above mentioned advantages
with the help of Capacitor, Synchronous Condenser, Phase Advancer etc.

Power factor is inversely proportional to current. So, if power factor increases, current
reduces and vice versa. In case of low power factor, current will be high and due to
high current losses will be high and bigger size of conductor required that will be
costly. Due to lower power factor, voltage regulation is affected i.e. there will be
higher voltage drop.

Any system which has a power factor close to 1 is considered as good or excellent
system.

Power Rating

It indicates the power at which machinery gives best performance without affecting
the machinery. There are various power ratings for appliances like watt or KW,
ampere or amps, volts, KVA. For 100% ef cient machinery KVA and KW is equal but
practically it’s not possible.

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KW Rating: Power consuming appliances are rated in KW rating, because we know
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their power factor. For example Motor, Electric kettle etc. are rated in KW.

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KVA Rating: Power supplying devices are rated in KVA rating, because we don’t
know their power factor as power factor is decided by the loads. For example,
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Transformer, Generator etc. are rated in KVA.
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Air Pump Images Picture
90 Degree Actives

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Tag: Electrical Power, Marine Engineering
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Ankit Kumar Singh

Marine Engineer, graduated from MERI Mumbai with ying colors, sailing
with reputed company, interested in ocean, writing with tea.

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