Corporate wide power factor correction application: economic and technical assessment

The Electricity and Cogeneration Regulatory Authority (ECRA) in Saudi Arabia issued a directive to charge commercial and industrial customers for reactive power consumption. Consequently, Saudi Aramco formed a taskforce to assess the economic and technical impact on the company as a result of the new ECRA resolution. Relevant data were collected from more than eight hundred (800) sites and potential increase in utility charges was estimated to be twenty million dollars ($20MM) on annual basis. Corrective measures were studied from both technical and economic standpoints and recommendations were made for each applicable facility. The recommendations included utilizing onsite synchronous machines and/or installation of Power Factor Correction (PFC) capacitor banks to locally support the reactive power requirements. PFC capacitor banks, being the most common solution, were studied in detail, and directions were provided to avoid potential compromises in system reliability.