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VFD versus Control Valve for pump flow controls Single Phase to Three Phase VFD

It's commonly to control a centrifugal pump with a VFD (variable frequency drive) rather than couple a Wiki
constant speed pump with a control valve on the discharge. However, many engineers don't understand Case study
variable frequency drives impact on flow and how that affects control. VFD Market
A pump/control-valve combination provides smooth flow even at very small valve openings, although in
Troubleshooting
some cases protection against low flow is required. However, with VFD-driven pumping, flow isn't always
smooth at reduced speeds due to either the pump or the VFD.
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Here, we'll focus on the pump — specifically, how certain
aspects of the pump performance curves can lead to variations Variable frequency drive application ...
in flow at reduced speeds — because this requires the expertise Variable Frequency Drive
of people in the process group, not the electrical department. (VFD) can be used in lots
Most electrical departments can provide a good analysis of the of fields. Variable frequency
VFD but aren't familiar with pump performance curves. drives are widely used to
control the speed of ...
Constant speed pump
Low flow protection for a centrifugal pump with a constant speed
drive normally entails recirculation back to either an upstream
vessel or to the suction of the pump. A proven approach is to
measure the flow through the pump and send the value to a Figure 1. As the valve closes, friction
controller that manipulates a control valve in the recirculation head increases, leading to lower flow.
line.
VFD manufacturers
The set point for the controller is the minimum required pump flow. Under normal operating conditions, flow buy@vfds.org
should exceed this level; so the controller will close the valve in the recirculation line. However, should flow tech@vfds.org
drop below the minimum, the controller will quickly open the control valve to provide the necessary flow.

A control valve also is required in the line to the process to

provide appropriate flow. In some configurations, this flow loop is
the inner loop for a level-to-flow cascade, a temperature-to-flow
cascade or other cascade arrangement. In some cases, the flow
isn't measured; instead the output of the level, temperature or
other controller is connected directly to the control valve.

Often some modifications are made to reduce costs. We'll

assume a flow controller here, but the points generally apply to
all configurations.

Because pressure measurements are less expensive than flow Figure 2. The variance in head leads to
ones, a measurement of either discharge pressure or pump twice as much variance in flow.
differential pressure is substituted for the pump flow
measurement. The success of this approach depends on the nature of the pump performance curves; it only
works if the pressures significantly change with pump flow.

The control valve can be avoided by inserting a fixed orifice into the recirculation piping. This provides some
recirculation at all times, even when the process flow exceeds the minimum necessary for low flow
protection. It requires extra energy and, possibly, a larger pump.

VFD-driven pumping
In contrast, with a variable frequency drive a flow measurement
is used to adjust a speed or torque controller included with the
VFD electronics.
Manufacturers always stress possible energy savings with a
variable frequency drive. However, especially in industries such
as specialty chemicals, few VFDs are large enough to provide
sufficient energy savings to justify their additional cost.

However, a variable frequency drive offers other potential

benefits. It may make the following equipment unnecessary:

sensor/transmitter for pump flow

recirculation piping
control valve in the recirculation piping
control valve in the line to the process
Figure 3. Only pump speeds greater
than 2,370 rpm provide flow.
The controller for pump flow also is eliminated but this
component is likely to be in the software of the digital controls and therefore "free."

The above only considers normal process operations. The

minimum flow for the variable frequency drive will be lower than
that for the constant speed VFD but won't be zero. There are
always startup issues to be addressed and usually other
considerations. For example, it may be important to prevent fluid
backflows through the pump. If positive shutoff is required, the
control valve in the line to the process must be replaced by a
block valve.

Nevertheless, eliminating even a single item of equipment,

particularly one that would be made of stainless steel or other
expensive material, may easily offset the additional variable Figure 4. The variance in head causes
frequency drive cost. And these savings come upfront, which triple the variation in flow.
appeals to project managers.

A variable frequency drive also can provide maintenance

savings. Control valves are high upkeep items, and handling
corrosive and toxic fluids makes matters worse. Just replacing a
control valve with a block valve reduces maintenance costs.

From a control perspective, a variable frequency drive has

another distinct advantage — it doesn't exhibit stiction,
hysteresis and other mechanical issues posed by a control
valve. Today's VFDs incorporate either speed control or torque
control, thus providing the counterpart to the positioner advocated by control engineers for control valves.

Flow regulation with a control valve

The flow through a pump is determined by the following curves:

Pump performance curve (or just "pump curve"). This curve, provided by the pump manufacturer,
relates pump flow, pump head and pump speed.
System performance curve (or just "system curve"). This curve relates the head and flow of all
components in the fluid flow path (the flow system) excluding the pump. Two components determine
this curve:
Static head. This is the difference in head across the flow system when flow is zero. It includes
pressure head and hydrostatic head. The pump must work against this head even at zero flow.
Friction head. As flow increases, pressure drop due to the fluid's resistance to flow increases by
approximately the square of the flow. All components in the flow system contribute to friction
head.

Suppose friction head is known for a specific flow. (This data point should be available from design
calculations.) Assuming friction head varies with the square of the flow, the system curve can be
approximated by:

HP = HS + HD (QP/QD)2 (1)

where QP is process flow, gal/min; HP is head at process flow

QP, ft; HS is static head, ft; QD is design flow, gal/min; and HD
is friction head at flow QD, ft.

The operating point is always where the pump curve intersects

the system curve.
Control valves regulate flow by varying friction head — that is,
they work entirely through the system curve, as illustrated in
Figure 1. It presents system curves for a fully open control valve
and a control valve that is 75% open. For the fully open valve,
flow is 177 gal/min. As the control valve closes, resistance to
flow increases. This raises the friction head component of the
system curve, which makes that curve intersect the pump curve
at a lower flow — at 75% open, flow is 127 gal/min. Figure 5. As speed increases, the impact
of speed changes on flow decreases.
Small variations in both static and friction head occur in any
pumping installation. These head variations cause flow variations, which also can be determined from the
performance curves.

Suppose the static head is 60 ±1 ft. Figure 2 shows system curves for 59 ft. and 61 ft. and where they
intersect with the pump curve. For the fully open control valve, flow is 177 ±2 gal/min; for the 75% open
control valve, flow is 127 ±2 gal/min. In each case, a head variance of ±1 ft. leads to a flow variance of ±2
gal/min.

Closing the control valve doesn't significantly affect the

propagation of variance from head to flow. But as we shall see,
this isn't necessarily the case for VFD controlled pumps.

Flow regulation with a variable frequency drive

With VFD-driven pumping, the system curve is fixed but the
pump curve shifts with pump speed. Some manufacturers
provide pump curves for certain selected speeds; others provide
a pump curve only for the rated speed of a constant speed VFD.
In either case, the affinity laws can be applied to obtain pump
curves at other speeds:
Figure 6. Nonlinear relationship can
Q(N) = QC (N/NC) (2) hamper using PID control.
H(N) = HC (N/NC)2 (3)

where N is speed, rpm; NC is speed for the pump curve supplied by the manufacturer, rpm; Q(N) is
volumetric flow at speed N, gal/min; QC is volumetric flow at speed NC (from the pump curve), gal/min; H(N)
is head at speed N, ft.; and HC is head at speed NC (from the pump curve), ft.

Flow decreases in proportion to the pump speed; head decreases in proportion to the square of the pump
speed. The affinity laws also state that power decreases with the cube of the pump speed, which
strengthens the energy savings arguments by variable frequency drive manufacturers.

Figure 3 illustrates regulating flow by varying pump speed. The system curve is fixed. For a pump speed of
3,450 rpm, the flow through the pump is 177 gal/min; for 2,850 rpm, 98 gal/min; and for 2,370 rpm, 0 gal/min.
In fact, 2,370 rpm is the minimum pump speed for flow — that is, flow occurs only for speeds above 2,370
rpm.

The minimum speed to obtain flow is easily computed. When there's no flow, the system head is the static
head. The pump curve shows the head delivered by a pump with no flow and running at speed NC. The
minimum pump speed to obtain flow is computed using the affinity laws:

Nmin = NC (HS/HC0)½ (4)

where Nmin is minimum pump speed for flow, rpm; HS is static head (from the system curve); and HC0 is
head at speed NC and zero flow (from the pump curve), ft.

For our example, NC is 3,450 rpm, HS is 60 ft., and HC0 is 127 ft. The minimum pump speed is 2,370 rpm.
So, the variable frequency drive must operate over the range of 2,370 rpm to 3,450 rpm. The minimum
speed is 69% of the maximum speed; the turndown ratio is 1.46:1. variable frequency drives are easily
capable of this.
Figure 4 illustrates propagation of variance from static head to
flow for pump speeds of 3,450 rpm and 2,450 rpm. At 3,450
rpm, a static head of 60 ±1 ft. gives a flow of 127 ±2 gal/min (just
like for the fully open control valve). However, at 2,450 rpm, a
static head of 60 ±1 ft. gives a flow of 19 ±6 gal/min. As the
pump speed decreases, the variance in flow increases by a
factor of three.

Even with this increase in variance, the pump probably would

still perform satisfactorily. At low flows, the pump curve in Figure
4 exhibits a significant sensitivity of head to flow. This isn't the
case for all pumps. For some, the pump curve at low flows is Figure 7. More linear relationship better
essentially flat (slope is zero) — that is, at low flows, pump head matches the PID control equation.
is independent of flow. For such pump curves, the propagation
of variance from static head to pump flow would be much larger.
Pumps with a flat pump curve at low flows likely will experience cycling between no flow and some positive
flow. Avoid them if you want a variable frequency drive to perform smoothly at low flows. Pumps with pump
curves such as in Figure 6 probably wouldn't exhibit the cycling.

Sensitivity of flow to pump speed

It's also important to understand the change in flow produced by a given change in pump speed.

Figure 5 presents the sensitivity of flow to pump speed for the

range of speeds over which the pump could operate. (The
somewhat erratic nature of the graph is the result of digitizing
the pump curve.) It shows that the sensitivity increases as the
pump speed decreases — that is, at low pump speeds, a
change in speed has a larger effect on flow than the same
change at high speeds.

Such a change in sensitivity affects the performance of the

control loop (flow, level, temperature or other) whose output
determines the pump speed. As the sensitivity increases, more
oscillations can be expected in that loop. So, to use the same
Figure 8. Value remains relatively
tuning at low flows and at high flows, either tune the loop under
constant over the entire operating range.
a low flow condition or conservatively tune the loop at high
flows. The results are essentially the same — the controller is tuned with a lower gain. For the controller to
function at low flows, performance is sacrificed at high flows.

While techniques such as scheduled tuning could address this problem, conservative tuning usually can
accommodate a change in sensitivity of 3:1. But it's possible that the change in sensitivity could far exceed
3:1. At low flows, the pump curve in our example exhibits a significant sensitivity of head to flow. However,
the pump curve for some pumps is basically flat. For such pumps, the increase in sensitivity would be much
larger than 3:1 and could even lead to instabilities in the loop that outputs to the pump speed.

Torque
Pump curves traditionally are drawn with pump speed as a
parameter. This might imply that the flow through the pump is
best controlled by varying the pump speed, but it isn't
necessarily the case. Changing the torque may make more
sense. variable frequency drives can control either of these
variables.

When the input signal to the VFD electronics adjusts pump

speed, the relationship between flow through the pump and
pump speed is important. This can be computed from the pump
curve and system curve (Figure 6). The departure from linearity
is noticeable — and is consistent with the changes in the
sensitivity of flow to speed (Figure 5).
Figure 9. High sensitivity of flow to
speed at low rpm could lead to cycling.
When the input signal to the VFD electronics adjusts torque, the
relationship between flow through the pump and torque is important. This also can be computed from the
pump curve and system curve (Figure 7). The graph exhibits only a slight departure from linearity, making it
preferable for PID control as that control equation is linear.

Figure 8 presents the sensitivity of flow to torque for the range

over which the pump could operate. The somewhat erratic
nature of the graph is the result of digitizing the pump curve. The
sensitivity changes only slightly over the operating range.

These graphs were computed from the pump curve (Figure 5),
which exhibits significant sensitivity of head to flow at low pump
flows. As already mentioned, for some pumps the pump curve is
flat at low flows — that is, the head is almost constant at such
flows.
Figure 9 shows flow as a function of speed for a pump with a flat
pump curve. The departure from linearity is much greater. At low
Figure 10. Nearly linear relationship
flows this graph is almost vertical, so the sensitivity of flow to
offers advantage for control.
speed at low flows will be very large, which could lead to cycling
in the flow.

However, even for a pump with a flat pump curve, the relationship between flow and torque is nearly linear
(Figure 10). Generally linear behavior leads to better performance from the controls.

So, for a centrifugal pump with a variable frequency drive it's usually preferable to use torque to control flow.
This also seems consistent with the future directions for variable frequency drive technology.

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