Plastics
industry

Customer challenges
in the plastics industry

The plastics industry utilizes various machines and processes to manufacture an extensive variety of diverse products for a wide range of industries, including building and construction, textile, electronics, aerospace, packaging, and transportation.

Power quality issues have been around for a long time. For example, most motor failures happen because of current harmonics in the system caused by non-linear loads such as Variable Frequency Drives (VFD). Unfortunately, even the slightest power or motor failure can disturb and negatively affect operations at any phase of the extremely delicate and critical process of plastics manufacturing. However, harmonics are not the only power quality issues that can lead to expensive damage. Transients, power sags, swells, and low power factor all can contribute to issues in the facility and affect energy efficiency. Low power factor is an indication of low energy efficiency and can result in excessive utility bills as well as costly penalties for not complying with demanding grid codes and other power quality standards.

If molten plastic stops flowing, it instantly solidifies right into the pipes and causes substantial financial losses for the manufacturer. A large amount of expensive material gets lost, and production stalls when the facility has to shut down for maintenance to clean out pipes and possibly service sensitive equipment that got damaged in the process. Sub-par power can burn out motors, disrupt controllers, blow fuses, reduce equipment lifetime, falsely active protection devices, prevent operating at full load, cause data errors and losses, induce flicker, damage transformers, capacitors, and other components, and even completely destroy electronic equipment.

Merus^® Solutions improving power quality
in the plastics industry

• Uninterrupted stable power and high process reliability
• No risk of nuisance tripping
• Avoidance of unexpected production and maintenance losses
• Reduction in heat losses and lower operating costs
• Extended lifetime of electrical equipment in the plant