Nonstop monitoring [power quality]

A power failure could spell disaster for a large financial institution. The author describes the role of fixed power quality monitoring systems in ensuring that the trading never has to stop. Consulting engineers and site facility managers are increasingly of the opinion that supply quality in a modern commercial building demands the installation of a fully integrated, fixed power quality monitoring system, operating 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. The PegaSys system, manufactured in Canada by Power Measurement Ltd of Victoria, British Columbia, and marketed in the UK by C-Matic Systems is an example of a modern, highly flexible, power monitoring system. A typical installation consists of one or more monitoring PCs connected to a network of fixed power quality instruments installed at all of the key supply points throughout a building. The PC's graphical interface depicts the electrical layout of the building, indicating the location of each monitoring instrument, together with the status of load levels or approaching alarm limits. Typically, a user will have one main screen where system condition can be viewed at a glance. More detailed information is available by navigating down through the hierarchy of screen layers. The objective of the system is to provide load trending for system planning together with pre-fault alarming, so that, as far as is humanly possible, power outages are avoided.