How Much Power Does Your Facility Need?

Opening a new facility can be a very exciting time, especially your first. It can also be a very stressful time. Here at Agro Lighting, we do everything we can to help lighten the load for our clients. Unfortunately, sometimes we get to them too late. One of the biggest hurdles to overcome when designing a new facility is not having enough power to run all of the equipment necessary to make your business successful and scalable. Below, I will go over some common mistakes we see when designing facilities, talk briefly about the equipment you will need to consider to run a successful operation, and explain how to decide how much power to bring into your facility. What to Consider and What to Avoid

One of the biggest challenges when designing a facility for a client is being limited by power. In a perfect world, we would be brought on before any decisions are made, calculate exactly how much power will be needed, and make recommendations with the end goal in mind. Unfortunately, that’s not always the case. Sometimes we are designing a pre-existing facility, and sometimes the client has already hastily decided and moved forward before we have the chance to consult. Below we will highlight some common mistakes to avoid and arm you with the information you need to make the right choices for your new facility.

Before calculating how much power you’ll need, you’ll want to have a complete list of necessary equipment along with the wattage it takes to run it. This list might include lighting, HVAC, irrigation, water pumps, fans, air purifiers, dehumidifiers, processing machines, security systems, automated vents and blackout covers, outdoor facility lighting, as well as anything you may need for your office. We recommend doing your calculations in watts rather than amps because your total available amps will vary based on your voltage. For example, if your facility has 1,000 available amps at 120V, you will only have 500 available amps at 240V, and things will get really complicated once you start factoring in both, which is usually the case. Most manufacturers will provide the wattage for their product, but if they don’t, you can do the calculations on your own. Just multiply the listed volts by the listed amps to get your wattage.

Ok, so great! Now you know how many watts you will need available to run all of your equipment. All there is left to do now is decide on voltage, calculate how many amps you need, and relay that information to your power company, right? Think again! According to the National Electric Code (NEC), you can only use 80% of your power capacity for constant loads. The other 20% must be reserved for surges in power. When you power on your equipment, you can experience up to a 20% increase in power consumption until things level out to the constant load. Regulations like this one are designed to keep you, your facility, and your crop safe, and ensure that you’re not tripping your breaker every time your equipment kicks on. That would not only be inconvenient but could be devastating to your crop if not caught in time!

Lastly, it is important to plan for the future. The cannabis industry is growing rapidly, demand is higher than ever, and your business will eventually grow as well and likely have a need to expand. One of the many benefits of LED lighting is its ability to get much closer to the canopy without losing coverage or harming the plant. This close proximity option allows your facility to grow multiple tiers within the same space, providing your ceiling height allows it. After all, why build a whole new facility when you can double, or triple production in the space that's already available to you. If you are building a new facility, you have a chance to save yourself from the costly expense of adding more power down the road if you plan accordingly. All this means is that as you are calculating the wattage you will need, you must account for the equipment you will be using once your facility reaches its full potential, not just what you will need right away. The same thought can be applied when designing your HVAC system and purchasing your racks and dehumidifier. This will not only save you from buying things twice, but it should extend the life of your equipment as you won't need to push it as hard.

How to Decide How Much Power to Bring In

Now that you know what to consider and what to avoid, let’s talk about how to make your calculations. For starters, you will need to have a good understanding of the formula used to calculate total available power and understand what everything means. The formula is always (Watts=Volts x Amps). For example, if you know all your equipment will draw a total of 100,000 watts and you have 240V outlets, the equation would be (100,000/240=Amps) which would equal 416.66 amps. Keep in mind that you’ll want to add an additional 20% to your total power to account for the initial power surge when your equipment starts up. Your transformer capacity will be listed by your power supplier as KVA or Kilo-Volt-Amps. So let's just say your power company lists 100 KVA. This really just means that your transformer is capable of providing 100 Kilowatts of power, or 100,000 watts. Which again translates to 80,000 watts of usable power according to the NEC. When designing your facility, you will be in 1 of 2 positions. You’ll either have an existing building with power already installed, or you’ll be starting from scratch and have a say in how much and what type of power to bring in. This will dictate which order you do things. If you have a pre-existing facility, you will already know how much power is available and will need to make sure your equipment does not exceed 80% of that capacity. If it just simply is not enough, you will have no choice but to bring in more power or be forced to downsize. If you are starting from scratch, you will want to calculate how many watts you will need before talking to the power company.

This brings us to choosing your voltage with your electrician and deciding on single or 3 phase power. Most facilities will use either 120 or 240 volts. 120v will use a standard NEMA 5-15 plug, and 240V will use a NEMA 6-15 plug like you typically see on your washer and dryer at home. We recommend using 240V when given the choice. 240v will give you about a 3-4% savings on your monthly energy bill, but the real savings come from the cost of installation. If your circuit breakers are 240v and the same amperage, then you would have twice the amount of power per breaker vs using 120v breakers. So if you are building an electrical panel from scratch, then use 240v breakers. If you are using an existing panel, there’s no point in changing anything as there will be no additional cost of installation. Lastly, If you have 3 phase power available, then you should take advantage of it. 3 phase power allows you to get 3 times the power capacity of single-phase power. 3 phase is also more efficient when running cyclical devices such as fans and motors. You will need to work with your electrician to make sure that your power usage is balanced between the 3 phases.

We hope you’ve found this information useful and have a better understanding of how to bring power into your facility. Please feel free to contact one of our experts if you have any questions or would like us to help you with your facility design.

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