UPSonNet launches a UPS Guide to build UPS Strategy for Power Protection

The natural instinct when in need of a UPS is to contact a supplier, and ask for a solution that meets the immediate requirement. This approach doesn't always render the best results. The solution that solves the current problem may restrain us from adopting preferable solutions in the future. A UPS strategy that serves best both our present and future needs should be considered before taking action.

To solve the problem, UPSonNet introduces Three Phase UPS Strategy guide, aimed to help building a Power Protection strategy from 10kVA to 700kVA installations in order to meet current requirements and to provide guiding map for future use, whenever additional power is required.

The strategy considers three main points:

Firstly, the required UPS Protection level should be decided in order to select the needed system configuration.

Secondly, the current UPS Size and expected future UPS capacity needs should be defined in order to filter out UPS systems that do not meet the requirements.

Finally UPS Cost should be considered, and a proper specific UPS make and type should be decided based on equipment price and UPS running costs.

Required Power Protection

The guide presents main systems from major UPS manufacturers, all providing conditioned output voltage with the quality needed to power the critical equipment. If the UPS never fails, the load is always supplied with conditioned power and UPS protection level is 100%. Unfortunately UPS systems do fail and conditioned power is unavailable during UPS repair time.

UPS Protection level in this respect is defined by UPS Availability, expressed by the ratio of the mean time when the UPS operates correctly, to the total time which includes also the mean time to repair.

The required Availability and the possible time to repair dictate the type of UPS system, and whether a single UPS unit is sufficient, or a redundant system with additional spare UPS units is needed, to allow operation even if a UPS fails.

The guide helps in defining the required Availability, and the System configurations, as well the Availability and required time to repair in redundant cases.

Required UPS Size

Grow as you Go approach is the most reasonable UPS protection strategy for current and future needs. The idea is to start with a small system that meets current UPS capacity requirements, and add UPS units in parallel when more power is required. Some additional points should however be considered if this path is decided.

Only UPS systems of the same size make and type can be connected in parallel, thus the possible scaling depends on the particular UPS selected initially.

The maximum number of allowed parallel UPS systems depends on the particular

UPS make and type; thus estimation of the expected future power needs is required.

In addition, adding parallel systems decreases UPS reliability. Thus, in order to maintain the specified Availability when more UPS units are added, increased redundancy may be required.

Cost Effective UPS Solution

Initial UPS cost versus power can be deduced from Market Price Directory presented on UPSonNet website, which by using smart UPS selection guided approach, can reduce the initial cost considerably, enabling to gain thousands of dollars.

Running costs are generally higher and therefore more important than the initial investment. These costs depend mainly on UPS efficiency. The Guide shows the efficiencies of the presented UPS types, guiding how selecting the proper UPS protection system can reduce the running cost by almost 50%.