WEG supports hospital with emergency power

Motor and alternator manufacturer WEG has supplied eight 1,700 kVA alternators to provide emergency power to the Clinical Centre of Serbia’s newly expanded facilities.

In this article, Marek Lukaszczyk, European and Middle East marketing manager at WEG, highlights the importance of effective backup power systems to cover unexpected mains power failure.

The Clinical Centre of Serbia, located in country’s capital, Belgrade, treats one million patients each year. The hospital has 3,150 hospital beds, making it the highest number of beds in Europe. In August 2018, the president of Serbia, Aleksander Vučić, announced a government investment of 110 million euros into a complex facilities reconstruction at the centre, to be implemented between 2018 and 2022.

Extra 28,000m² of new buildings

This new construction will provide an additional 28,000m² of new buildings, including new operating rooms, dispensaries and a thousand or more additional bed units. As well as new air-conditioning systems and mechanical installations, a major challenge, as with any hospital build, is to provide an effective power supply system.

Adverse weather conditions, spikes in demand or any kind of technical malfunctions on the main power grid, can interrupt the supply of power and adversely affect the many sensitive activities that take place in the medical centre. Hospitals, therefore, need a back-up electrical system, often in the form of diesel generators to ensure continuous power.

The bidding process to manufacture these systems for the Clinical Centre of Serbia was intense. All of the major world producers of generators were involved, striving to meet the strict and challenging criteria of the brief. Extended warranty and experience in similar applications were specified, along with competitive pricing.

Best components for the task

In the end, Serbia’s biggest producer of generator sets, Tehnolink, won the contract to supply the generators. The company designs, manufactures, assembles and services diesel- and gas-powered generator sets. It was also down to Tehnolink to source the best components for the job including the alternators, engines and radiators, in order to provide the Serbian hospital with an effective dependable power supply system.

To win the project with Tehnolink, WEG had to present a case for its technical capabilities. WEG’s alternators stood out from the competition, because of their solid construction cast-iron frame, specifically the manufacturer’s AG10 line, which were preferred to the rolled-steel alternatives. The cast-iron frame allows for better power density, reduced vibration and more efficient cooling.

WEG also offered its own technology with the alternator, to emulate the characteristics of an exterior permanent magnet generator, without increasing the length and price of the machine. WEG’s I-PMG technology is an integrated separate winding within the machine that eliminates the need for an external PMG, which allows for a smaller footprint than competitors’ systems and keeps costs down.

Permanent magnet inserts

WEG alternators are designed and fabricated in-house and come with permanent magnet inserts (PMI) on the exciter field, as standard. “With other manufacturers, this is an optional extra and sometimes not even presented as an option, unless an alternator of 1,000 kVA or more is specified by the buyer,” says WEG.

The PMI removes issues of loss of excitation in facilities with big loads and allows instantaneous power on start-up. There is no need to flash the windings, in case of a loss of residual magnetism. In critical facilities, such as hospitals, this is essential.