Fuji Electric Review
Vol.67-No.1,2021
Power Electronics Contributing to Energy Saving, Compactness, and Increased Productivity
Power Electronics Contributing to Energy Saving, Compactness, and Increased Productivity
In the field of industrial plants and infrastructure, efforts are being made to save energy and resources to reduce environmental impacts, in addition to promoting automation and labor saving, to create a responsible and sustainable society. Moreover, there is a growing trend to improve productivity through production reforms.
This special issue will introduce Fuji Electric’s global power electronics products that are compact and low power consumption, which help reduce environmental burdens in the fields of industrial plants and infrastructure. It will also present equipment diagnosis technology that utilizes IoT to improve productivity, as well as power electronics products with the technology for optimal equipment replacement.
FUJITA, Hideaki
TETSUTANI, Hiroshi; MATSUMOTO, Yasushi; LIU, Jiangheng
Fuji Electric has been working on technologies such as using SiC and other new semiconductor devices, increasing the voltage of power electronics equipment to reduce transmission loss, and using quantity control of parallel operation to suppress no load loss, contribute to high efficiency and energy saving. In addition to the development of products that eliminate the need of output transformers and reactors for parallel connection, we have optimized the design of main circuits and cooling units to reduce the size and weight of power electronics equipment and incorporate it into various systems.
To improve production efficiency, we have enhanced the control response speed and performance of power electronics equipment and increase system reliability through sensor-based diagnostic technology and redundancy, achieving high equipment availability. Moreover, a traceback function, which can quickly identify the cause of accidental failures, and unit structure that facilitates the replacement of a failed unit will help shorten equipment downtime, contributing to high productivity.
Energy Saving and Size Reduction
TANAKA, Katsuhisa; MATSUNAGA, Kazuhisa; YAMAMOTO, Katsuya
The recent growth in automobile production has increased the demand for medium-frequency induction furnace used in production of casting parts. In addition, the increase in the stringency of energy saving regulations in various countries has created a greater need for high efficiencies and large capacities. Fuji Electric has developed the “F-MELT100G Series,” which comes with a high-voltage IGBT stack and high-efficiency furnace body that improves the melting consumption rate. These enhancements reduce electricity consumption, and a wide range of products are available with a power supply capacity of up to 20 MW. Moreover, this series is equipped with a direct digital control unit with self-check and RAS functions, enabling it to stabilize operations for systems and to quickly identify the cause of failures.
KUZE, Naoki; MORISHIMA, Yosuke
In recent years, it has been anticipated that the market for renewable energy equipment, including solar cells, will increase throughout the world. Fuji Electric has developed a high-voltage high-capacity power conditioning system (PCS) for overseas markets that has an input voltage of 1,500 V DC and an output capacity of 2.5 MW. The PCS comes with an outdoor panel structure that complies with IP55 dustproof and waterproof standards. In addition, it has achieved a smaller installation footprint through its improved cooling performance and optimized layout of the components. In order to meet the expected growth of the Southeast Asian market, the PCS meets grid interconnection codes in Thailand and the Philippines.
FUJITA, Kenji; KOBAYASHI, Nobuyuki
Fuji Electric provides traction equipment and electric door systems for railcars that utilize the latest power electronics technology. We have developed compact and lightweight on-board equipment with low-power consumption to save energy and fully active damper drive systems to improve passenger comfort. In addition, we have reduced the failure rate and enhanced the safety of our electric door systems by improving the component confi guration and the maintenance processes. We have been actively promoting these products in Japan and overseas markets, such as North America and Asia, and are pursuing to meet overseas standards and to increase local production.
HIROSE, Hideo; SASAKI, Toshiya; NAKAYA, Ryota
In order to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions to virtually zero by 2050, it is necessary to introduce clean energy and reduce power consumption. Fluid apparatus is required to save energy, such as pumps, compressors, blowers, and coolers, because it accounts for a large percentage of motor applications and consumes a large amount of power. The PM motor Fuji Electric has newly developed is improved in efficiency and cooling performance to achieve compactness, allowing users to downsize their equipment. Furthermore, it achieves better energy savings by using inverter-based variable speed operation and direct drive operation, which uses no belts and gears to avoid mechanical loss.
OKI, Kazuhiro; YATSUDA, Yutaka; HASHIZUME, Shingo
Control panels for social and industrial infrastructure are being required to use smaller power supplies to accommodate increasingly sophisticated and large-scale systems. Using industrial platform power supply technology, Fuji Electric has developed compact power supplies for control panels that incorporate redundancy functions to reduce wiring. This product makes it possible to mount a larger number of devices, thereby further contributing to sophistication and scalability of control panels. The unit comes with dedicated output terminals to ensure compatibility with existing control panels to facilitate replacement. We also provide a model that can operate maintenance-free for 10 years for users in various industries.
Productivity Improvement
TAKAMI, Yuichi; YAYAMA, Takahiro; YAMAZAWA, Kotaro
General-purpose inverters have been recently expanded to various applications, and in addition to enhancing control performance, they are being required to improve energy saving, environment resistance, and preventive maintenance. Our newly developed “FRENIC-MEGA (G2) Series” improves control performance through faster processing and advancements in our proprietary motor control technology. It also enhances energy saving capability supporting PM motor drive as standard and environmental resistance complying with JIS C60721-3-3 and Class 3C2 of IEC 60721-3-3. Its functions for traceback, predicting product life for maintenance, and customizable logic allow it to be used for various applications.
SATO, Kazuhisa; AWAI, Akihiro; OMORI, Takashi
Controlling a motor with a general-purpose inverter occasionally needs to suppress input current harmonics and to process motor braking energy. Fuji Electric has developed the “FRENIC-RHC Series” of high power factor PWM converters with power regeneration function as a line-up of products that offer better features and operability than conventional PWM converters. The series has the following features: Capable of controlling large capacity equipment through the extended number of parallel connections, up to four, without isolation transformers, standardized traceback function for analyzing the causes of alarms; highly detailed monitoring of the operating conditions of the upper layer system via high-speed E-SX bus communications.
YAMADA, Tatsuya; ICHI, Yoshitaka; TAKAHASHI, Yoshikazu
Medium-voltage inverters that are over 20 years old and have reached the end of their service life need to be replaced with a new model. However, replacing the entire inverter panel will require additional foundation work, resulting in longer downtime periods for the facilities. In addition, depending on the installation location, other problems could occur, such as the service entrance being too narrow to carry in the panel. Therefore, Fuji Electric has developed the “FRENIC4600FM4RF Series,” as a line-up of retrofit components for the “FRENIC4600FM4 Series.” It can shorten the downtime periods and solve the carry-in problems by replacing only consumable components, such as inverter cells and control stacks, rather than the entire medium-voltage inverter panel.
HINATSU, Ryo
As conventional plant control systems are being streamlined and consolidated to improve productivity, compatibility is required for external dimensions and functions. These control systems are also needed to comply with the revised Japanese Industrial Standards (JIS), while simultaneously securing sustainability of existing equipment and saving maintenance work. To meet these demands, Fuji Electric developed the “FRENIC4000VM6” low-voltage industrial plant inverter. It is first equipped with the high-speed E-SX bus, capable of handling high-capacity communications, enabling it to improve control speeds and greatly increase the number of inverters per controller. These enhancements facilitate the building of large-scale plant systems.
YAMASHITA, Satoshi; TAKAYAMA, Tetsuya; TANIGUCHI, Toru
Servo systems have been increasingly used for applications in all types of industrial machinery, including semiconductor and LCD manufacturing equipment, electronic parts processing equipment, printing machines, packaging machines, and metal processing machines. To meet market demands, Fuji Electric has developed the new models of “ALPHA7 Series” that is compact and have enhanced overload capacity, as well as improved basic control performance, including the industry’s highest processing speed and high accuracy. It also comes with a new load torque monitoring function, open networks (EtherCAT), and safety functions that comply with functional safety standards. Combining it with Fuji Electric’s multivariate statistical process control (MSPC) can help users to improve safety, security and productivity.
New Products
NAGASHIMA, Jun; HISAMA, Hirotomo; TAKAHIRA, Isao
An ETC vehicle detector is one of the roadside devices that compose an ETC tollgate. It is the main device responsible for detecting the passage of vehicles. Fuji Electric has been providing a large number of vehicle detectors since the dawn of ETC systems. As of 2019, we have approximately 40% of the Japanese market share.
HIRATA, Tomoya; YAMANO, Akio;
In recent years, the demand for energy has been expanding worldwide due to population growth and economic growth. At the same time, various measures are being taken to counter global warming by reducing CO2 emissions and to realize a responsible and sustainable society. These circumstances have created increasing expectations for power conversion systems that efficiently and stably convert electrical energy. Expectations are also rising for insulated gate bipolar transistor (IGBT) modules as key devices used in power conversion systems.
SEKINO, Yusuke; MORIYA, Tomohiro
In recent years, demand has been increasing for more powerful and smaller power electronics equipment in various fields, including infrastructure fields such as railroads, solar power generation, and wind power generation. Therefore, the power semiconductor modules installed in power conversion systems need to have even lower loss and higher power density.