When constant power is critical, so is a reliable UPS.

By Henry Vere

Sophisticated electronic devices can be extremely sensitive to even the slightest power glitch, resulting in astonishing costs to businesses. These “power events” are typically not the result of a power blackout, but rather result from less conspicuous issues, such as sags in the voltage level or voltage transients. Ensuring continuity of just about any modern operation goes hand-in-hand with guaranteeing power quality and guarding against the abundance of power-related bugs, which cumulatively cost businesses billions of dollars each year.

Many power events are sags in the line voltage, where the line voltage dips, typically with a duration of less than a second, hardly noticeable to the human eye. For a computer, a server, or other sensitive equipment, this is enough of an interruption to knock the device offline. Surges, spikes, brownouts, and blackouts (the most severe and potentially destructive forms of power interruptions) accompany sags in the legions of power-quality issues.

Computers, servers, and IT equipment are usually designed with power supplies that have some ability to ride through outages of 10 to 50 minutes; however, this equipment may be knocked offline when operating in a sustained brownout condition or by fast high-voltage transients. This problem is compounded when the utility is supplying power to very sensitive testing equipment, such as the kind of sophisticated equipment in use at Veolia Environmental Services LLC (formerly Onyx Environmental Services), an Azusa, CA–based company providing environmental services and technical solutions, as well as hazardous waste management and solvent reclamation for industrial customers.

Veolia is able to give its customers the ability to properly dispose of chemical waste—the byproducts of manufacturing, electronics, computer recycling, blending fuel, and other processes using hazardous materials—in accordance with California’s stringent environmental requirements. As part of these requirements, strict tests are required in a controlled lab environment that has steady temperature and power. A typical test involves 100 samples, takes 14 hours to complete, and is conducted overnight in order to complete a testing run that yields the demanding results mandated.

Some of the testing conducted at Veolia is performed on a number of gas chromatography/mass spectrometer (GC/MS) instruments. A GC/MS is a very sophisticated system that determines individual chemical elements in a sample. The GC/MS draws power for both a heating element and the microprocessor-based onboard computer. For a short period of time after a test begins, the GC oven draws a very high current for the heating element.

This brief high-current demand causes the input voltage to drop at the input of the connected equipment.  Because the equipment is computer-controlled, every time the test system detects a power problem, it will create an anomaly in the mass spectrometer’s readings and stop the test. In trying to solve this problem, Shafiqul Alam, Veolia’s technical support manager, initially attempted to use an uninterrupted power supply (UPS) that was line-interactive and found that it didn’t solve the problem, according to Ron Seredian, sales director with the Irwindale, CA–based Falcon Electric Inc.

Testing Equipment With Special Needs
Veolia had such a problem within the past few years.  Its work depends on some very critical monitoring equipment, including a gas chromatograph and mass spectrometers, for the chemical waste it processes at its plant. The company’s testing devices must analyze everything coming into the treatment facility, and a mass spectrometer is needed for such evaluations. Mass spectrometers are very sensitive to power fluctuations.

There were mainly two issues Veolia faced with the setup of this type of sensitive analytical equipment, according to Alam, who has degrees in both chemical engineering and chemistry and is also a Registered California Chemical Engineer. 

“We have a chemical plant onsite, plus we have solvent waste coming in and out in 5,000-gallon tankers—eight to 10 tankers per day—and when the tankers come in, a sample needs to be taken and analyzed,” says Alam.  “If a tanker sits for too long, we end up paying demerits for that: If I can’t get my analysis done on time, it costs money literally by the minute.”

If there are power surges or spikes—anything that triggers a negative or positive pulse—this control monitoring software system will take that command and subsequently shut things down. “This is something of a worst-case scenario, as the electronics that are used are very, very sensitive, so if one of the components of the electronic circuits goes off, then everything else is pretty much off.  Electronic components inside were very easily fried. This ends up being a great expense—up to three or four thousand dollars, plus two to three days of downtime—as we would end up changing the whole electronic mother or main board in our system,” says Alam.

The second issue is that once a power spike, surge, or pulse happens, the monitoring equipment automatically goes into standby mode. Data collection and chemical monitoring is abandoned.

Data Collecting Lost Equals Production Lost
“If you are running a lab for eight hours a day, you easily utilize programs that keep things running and collecting data during unattended nighttime periods,” says Alam. “Then, usually, when the lab worker will show up first thing in the morning, they will simply review the monitoring data collected the night before. But when there is a pulse during the night, it stops everything. When the results are checked in the morning, nothing has been done and a great deal of productivity has been lost.”

With the installation of its online UPS system, Falcon Electric was able to prevent any power spikes from being sensed by this sensitive equipment. The UPS can only support a half-hour of power, which gives Veolia perhaps another RAM cycle. Even if the surge is for several seconds, the monitoring equipment does not sense it; therefore, the testing process prevents the company from experiencing a loss of productivity.

“The difference with us is that we cannot use just any UPS system,” says Alam.  “Our equipment draws constant preprogrammed power. It has to have the demand in place and can’t have any delay in the filtering process of the power. That’s why we needed an online UPS system.”

What the unit does is basically keep the instrument DC from feeling the delay needed to filter the spikes or ups and downs.  “Though it sounds very simple, this system does a lot of things for us,” says Alam. Veolia purchased the first such system around 2003.

“Initially, I searched the market first to see what type of UPS equipment was out there,” says Alam. “Next I had to discuss with others here the specific requirements we had. I eventually received an evaluation unit from Falcon Electric that I was able to use for a two-month trial period. It worked out, and now we have eight or 10 units. For us now it is pretty much standard that anytime we purchase some expensive equipment we also purchase a UPS from Falcon Electric for protection. So far, they are doing a good job.”

With this equipment being computer-controlled, every time the system detected a power anomaly or an anomaly in the mass spectrometer’s readings, the program would be halted. With its online UPS technology, Falcon Electric basically takes the incoming AC power and converts it to DC or regulates that DC and then recreates new AC power.

The first issue is that when this equipment runs, it runs from a strict controller. There is very precise temperature ramping involved. At the same time, the equipment software and hardware monitors status and takes action accordingly.

The line-interactive UPS did not work for Veolia, since it connects the utility line to power the equipment continuously. If and only if there is a gross change in utility voltage does this type of UPS change transformer taps or go to battery. This action is acceptable for some computer loads because the computer may have an internal power supply with enough ride-through capability. However, with a gas chromatograph or mass spectrometer, this is not the case, as it is sensitive to both voltage changes and fast high-voltage transients. The line-interactive UPS cannot react to these transients and passes them directly through to the connected equipment.

“Additionally, the manufacturer of the mass spectrometer informed Alam not to use a line-interactive UPS system, because they did not support large step-load changes well,” says Seredian. “Though this is true for the line-interactive UPS, it is not the case with the online UPS, as it has a lot of stored energy and low output impedance. In fact, since Alam has used the Falcon online UPS system, he hasn’t experienced any system resets despite the power problems that are inherent in his test lab. That has saved the company a lot of time and problems.

“The online UPS pulse-width-modulated inverter is always generating new, clean sinewave power—100% of the time,” says Seredian. “It uses AC power from the utility line, rectifies it to DC, regulates the DC, then filters and stores this energy in large capacitors. It then converts this DC back to clean AC sinewave output power. It is literally acts like an electronic firewall between the incoming utility power and the critical load.

“The equipment at Veolia demanded regulated, clean sinewave power free from transients,” says Seredian.  “Many people take the approach that ‘a UPS is a UPS is a UPS.’ This assessment is not even close.  You have mass-commercial quality and you have true industrial-grade.  That’s the difference.” The Falcon Electric system is an industrial-grade UPS system. 

Keeping the Voltage Steady
Falcon’s UPSs regulate the output voltage within a margin of 2%, according to Mike Stout, engineering manager with Falcon Electric for 18 years. “They also accept a very wide input voltage range,” says Stout.  “You can go anywhere from 84 volts to 140 volts and still have output of 120 volts plus– or minus–2%.”

In the event of the utility voltage falling below 84 V, the internal UPS batteries take over and provide power to the connected equipment instantaneously. More importantly, the clean output voltage—together with tight voltage regulation—eliminated the process problems Veolia had been experiencing.

Protecting Investments
Harsh power environments are extremely tough on sensitive equipment and computers. Many people don’t realize that in a lab filled with equipment, the line voltage can drop down to 100 V to 105 V.  Running a PC power supply on 105 V means that the system is a lot less efficient and there is much more heat generated, according to Stout.  The equipment’s reliability and service life may be adversely affected and shortened.

Veolia must sample the chemical waste entering the facility constantly, which requires its lab equipment’s reliability to be without question.  “But every time one of the mass spectrometers would hiccup, Veolia would lose an hour or two.  Those hours started piling up, and it began to affect their production,” says Stout.  “In addition, they are required to adhere to very stringent EPA regulations. When you have trucks arriving containing half a million gallons of chemical waste, things can back up real quick.”

Veolia takes in waste from a number of different industries.  First, it must be determined what the various waste products are composed of so the proper treatment or disposition action is initiated.  Some of the waste can be burned. Much of the material that enters the plant is recycled or reclaimed.

The Right Technology for the Right Application
“When Veolia contacted us, we were able to give them immediate support on the engineering side of things,” explains Stout. “Falcon prides itself in providing engineering support to all customers who are experiencing complex power problems. When a company such as Veolia contacts Falcon, they are immediately put in contact with one of our engineers, who will assist them in determining the best solution to their specific set of problems.” 

Falcon also provides expertise and products in the area of online UPS and power conversion technology.  “We have expanded our online UPS technology into the precision/active voltage regulator, frequency converter, and power conditioner markets,” says Stout. “Because the circuitry is active, online technology gives a level of performance well above inexpensive passive regulators and converters. These products include 50-, 60-, 400-hertz frequency converters covering a wide array of applications including sensitive military electronic systems. The technology is very flexible.”

Veolia needed the online UPS technology as well as the benefits of the superior voltage regulation and transient protection.  Veolia requested a battery backup system as a safeguard to ensure that the processes would run to completion.  “As a side note, unlike many of the low-cost, line-interactive, and offline UPS systems, our online technology is able to supply four to eight hours of battery backup if needed,” says Stout. 

Battery Life
“Battery life is not just a matter of proper charging,” says Stout. “The number of cycles that they are subjected to is also a factor.  Line-interactive UPS systems that incorporate a tap-change transformer for output voltage regulation will repeatedly go to battery during the tap change.  In a bad environment, the UPS batteries can be subjected to hundreds of battery cycles per day, reducing the battery life.

“With Falcon’s online technology, the batteries will experience much fewer use cycles than offline and line-interactive models. They will truly last the three to five years they’re supposed to last,” adds Stout.

In addition to overcycling of the batteries, temperature extremes will greatly reduce the service life of the standard valve-regulated, sealed lead acid (VRLA) batteries used in most UPSs today. As the Veolia lab has a temperature-controlled environment, the batteries inside the UPSs at Veolia’s lab are used in an ideal setting. For industrial and military customers, Falcon offers optional wide temperature range batteries that will survive environments with temperatures ranging from –10°C to 80°C. The company also offers configuration and battery options that other UPS systems typically do not offer.  “We didn’t just want to sell Veolia something: We wanted to provide them with a product that would solve their problem; if not, there wouldn’t have been a benefit for anyone involved.”

Backup Power in Diverse Places
Early in Falcon’s history, the company mainly private-labeled its patented online UPS products to other UPS companies. Today, Falcon Electric’s customer list reads like a who’s who of government agencies and industry in North and South America, according to Stout. Falcon has UPS systems in the FBI Crime Lab, in biomed labs, and on countless DNA analysis units.

“We’ve had a good deal of success here and in other places where we’ve sold our equipment for use with mass spectrometers,” says Seredian. “Due to their sensitive nature, a mass spectrometer really shouldn’t be sold without an online UPS system.”

Journalist Henry Vere specializes in topics related to science and engineering.

DE - March/April 2007