Make room for an electric kitchen.
The Line Runs in Two Services
The restaurant peaks at lunch, with refrigeration and the hoods running behind it all day.
An electric line comes up before each service and runs hard through it, so the kitchen lands on the two hours the facility is already busiest.
Try it at the size you are planning, and at the hour you would run it.
Run this on your own panel →After recovery, 374 A. It fits.
How We Make Room
- 01Add the new load to the peakThe code takes the highest demand the service has recorded, adds a 25% margin, then adds the new load. If the total is above the service rating, the load does not fit.
- 02Find what sets the peakWe measure every circuit at 15-minute intervals and find the loads that land together at each peak. The worst day sets the recorded peak, and the next is often close behind.
- 03Reshape the peakEach change moves or reduces a load at the peak, by staggering starts, changing schedules or controlling speed. The changes act every day, so every peak comes down together, and every load still does its job.
- 04Measure the peak againThe same circuits are measured after the changes. The new load is added to the lower peak and compared with the rating again.
- 05Run the new loadThe four steps above are the calculation, which counts the load on the peak whatever hour it runs. This is the week the facility gets: the load working in its own hours, on a service with room for it.
Counted as the 2023 NEC counts it: the recorded peak at 125%, plus the new load. The calculation follows whichever edition your authority has adopted.
Apply the Kitchen Demand Factor
A commercial kitchen never runs its whole line at once, and the code is written for that. Where six or more cooking units are installed, the connected load is counted at 65%.
One floor applies, and it protects the calculation from an empty kitchen: the counted load can never fall below the two largest units combined. The demand factor is what usually makes a kitchen the easiest of these five loads to fit.