It is a measure of the electric power that is needed to operate a pump (or collection of pumps), relative to the volume flow rate.
[1] It is commonly used when measuring the energy efficiency of buildings.
[2][3] The SPP for a specific operating point (combination of flow rate and pressure rise) for a pump system is defined as: where: Just as for SFP (i.e. fan power), SPP is also related to pump pressure (pump head) and the pump system efficiency, as follows: where: This equation is simply an application of Bernoulli's principle in the case where the inlet and outlet have the same diameter and same height.
Thus, in order to minimize energy use for pump system, one must reduce the system pressure drop (e.g. use large diameter pipes and low flow rates) in addition to selecting pumps with good intrinsic efficiency (hydrodynamically efficient with an efficient motor).
Applying the above equations enables us to estimate electrical power consumption in a number of ways: where: