Optical watthour meter digitizer

Technical Report · Wed Oct 01 04:00:00 EDT 1980

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/5133012· OSTI ID:5133012

Andrews, W. H.

As concern about energy conservation and energy-use efficiency increases, a simple and inexpensive instrument that would provide accurate, reliable and high-resolution data on electrical energy usage should find widespread application in research and industrial facilities. An instrument that would also provide one or more outputs compatible with a wide range of digital data acquisition systems would be especially appropriate, since the use of automatic data logging equipment is now common, even in small-scale and low-budget operations. An optical watthour meter digitizer was developed which meets these criteria. Based on the induction-type watthour meter, the digitizer provides an output pulse for a fixed amount of energy use. The digitizer senses the motion of the rotor disc of the meter by optically detecting passage of a nonreflective area painted on the underside of the disc. The passage of such area initiates a logic-compatible output pulse that can be used to measure power or energy usage in a variety of ways. The accuracy of the measurement is determined by the watthour meter. The resolution of the measurement is determined by the K/sub h/ constant (in watthours per revolution) of the meter and the number of equally spaced targets painted on the disc. The resolution of this device can be as small as a fraction of a watthour; the resolution of the manually read register on a watthour meter is typically a fraction of a kilowatthour. Several digitizers were fabricated, bench-tested, and installed in the field for long-term performance testing. All are performing satisfactorily.

• Research Organization: Oak Ridge National Lab., TN (USA)
• DOE Contract Number: W-7405-ENG-26
• OSTI ID: 5133012
• Report Number(s): ORNL/TM-7355
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATION
320303* -- Energy Conservation
Consumption
& Utilization-- Industrial & Agricultural Processes-- Equipment & Processes
DATA ACQUISITION SYSTEMS
ELECTRIC MEASURING INSTRUMENTS
ELECTRIC POWER
ELECTRICAL EQUIPMENT
ENERGY CONSERVATION
EQUIPMENT
INDUSTRIAL PLANTS
MEASURING INSTRUMENTS
METERS
OPERATION
OPTICAL EQUIPMENT
PERFORMANCE
POWER
POWER DEMAND
POWER METERS