Industrial Power Engineering Handbook [Hardcover]

The release of a new title by the renowned technical publishing house of Newnes / Butterworth-Heinemann is usually a noteworthy event for the technical fraternity. The title under review has come as a surprise, not only because it far exceeds the standard usually set for handbooks but also because it has achieved the unique distinction of being a reference work equally useful and valuable for industry professionals, practising engineers, consultants, technicians, students, teachers, research scholars and all others professionally interested in industrial power systems.

By virtue of their diversity, complexity and size, industrial power systems throw a formidable challenge to the electrical engineer. Standard electrical engineer's handbooks do not address the requirements of this special field completely. For the large number of day-to-day problems faced by production, operation and maintenance engineers working in industries there are few dedicated reference books to fall back upon for guidance. The ones that are available also do not cover the ground adequately. The present work is perhaps the most complete industrial power systems handbook currently available.

This is a reference for all engineers in design and application, protection and testing, production, project engineering, project implementation and maintenance. The text is structured into five parts. The essential theory of each topic is covered first, followed by industrial practice information. The idea is that detailed theory can always be gleaned from textbooks. Agrawal knows where exactly he must draw the line between theory and application engineering.

Mr. Agrawal has effectively bridged the gap between theory and practice in his book. Clear application data and guidelines, manufacturer's practices, application practices, commercially available ratings of machines, selection, operation and maintenance of equipment and plant, troubleshooting - all are covered in every conceivable detail. The material is cleverly keyed in to the recommendations of international standards organisations like ISO, IEEE, ANSI, BSI, DIN, IEC, etc.

One detailed flip-through leaves you convinced of the publisher's claim that "never before has so much ground been covered in a single volume reference source". Apart from doing yeomen's service to practising engineers, the author has done a great favour to teachers at technical institutes who have limited access to information from the Industry. Students will now not be deprived of this kind of information since teachers can always refer this excellent handbook to reply to questions raised in the classroom.

The production values of the book are excellent. Each page is lavishly illustrated with high quality drawings, graphs and photographs. The overall structuring of the book is excellent.

There is no capsule biography of the author anywhere in the book. For most readers Agrawal will remain only a name.

At the end of it all, the book emerges as a landmark achievement in its field. When you put it down, you cannot help wishing there were separate handbooks of identical character in the areas of transmission, distribution and utilization too.