Item — HN Reader

From the page: https://www.c-motive.com/applications/

>"C-Motive has designed a sub-5 kW (7 hp) industrial motor platform designed for direct drive applications where high efficiency and high torque lead to substantial operational savings; a 1.5 kW (2 hp) C-Motive machine could save up to $1,400 a year in energy costs in a typical industrial application."

[...]

"A C-Motive electrostatic generator, however, can be connected directly to the hub of the wind turbine and driven directly without an efficiency-robbing gearbox. This can add 20% or more to the annual energy output of the wind turbine..."

That seems like very promising future technology!

Wishing the C-Motive team a lot of luck with their electrostatic generators and electrostatic motors!

1 comments

$1400 a year in electricity at a high rate of $0.15/kWhr for all 8,760 hours in a year is about 1 kW in power savings. Reality check:

A typical 3-phase 2hp industrial motor [1] is over 85% efficient and typical 10:1 reduction gearbox [2] is 94% efficient, which results in about 3kW power usage and 20% power lost to heat, or approx 0.6 kW. If their motor is 100% efficient, used in a 100%-duty-cycle application, in an area with high electrical costs, and with similar reliability to the standard AC motor, this gives $800 or so in savings per year.

In a more typical application with a 50% operating duty cycle and $0.10/kWhr, and guessing at 96% efficiency for their motor, we're down to maybe $200 per year in savings. Larger (>=5hp) motors can be 91% or higher efficiency bringing savings down even more. I can't imagine how C-Motive will equal the reliability, so any extra maintenance could quickly wipe out the savings.

I would guess that a variable-frequency drive (VFD) on the above AC motor, used to control speed and improve the power factor, would have the same efficiency as their motor controller. So I only looked at the AC motor + gearbox versus the C-motive motor + fluid pump.

[1] - https://www.baldor.com/catalog/CEM3558T-5#tab=%22performance... [2] - https://www.bostongear.com/ecatalog?page=product&cid=worm_ge...