MEASUREMENT OF THE POWER-FACTOR OF 3-PHASE UNBALANCED LOADS

A need has been identified to introduce new power factor interpretations for unbalanced loads in order objectively to characterize the quality of the electrical power and encourage power consumers both to reduce reactive power and to balance the load. Only in this way can an appropriate amount of active electrical power be transmitted from generator to load with minimum loss in the transmission line or intermediate equipment. Circuits of the most frequently used three-phase power factor meters have been considered, and their errors arising from three-phase current and voltage unbalance are given.