Power Plants

Repairing Underground Power Cables Is Nearly Impossible

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In 1989, this story about an underground electrical transmission line spread across the early internet like wildfire. It had a big impact on me as a kid, and I wanted to share it with you! I think the Scattergood-Olympic transmission line is probably LA's most famous power line, although it has now been replaced with a more modern line since 2018.

This is a good thing, less light pollution. 💡

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With the growth of electric cars and renewable energy, many cities will get priced out of street lighting, forcing them to extinguish many street lights.

This is a good thing, less light pollution. 💡

Most street lighting is only affordable now because utilities have such enormous need for spinning reserve to meet the morning ramp.

But if early morning energy prices surge with electric cars and no solar at night, cities could easily get priced out of the street lighting business except the minimum absolutely necessary.

Why High LPW Means Sacrificing Fixture Performance –

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Exposing the LED Lumens Per Watt Loophole: Why High LPW Means Sacrificing Fixture Performance –

For a long time I've been fascinated by very energy efficient LED bulbs rather than the rather energy hogging LED bulbs currently available. Why don't manufacturers make energy efficient bulbs?

For one, it's cheaper to overdrive and abuse LED bulbs so they burn out quicker and require fewer chips. But also most of the ultra efficient bulbs - those pushing 200 lumens a watt have lousey color rendition, are cold white, put out a lot of glare and don't do a good job at putting light where needed. 

America can be explained by our choice of 60 Hz electricity. 🇺🇸

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America can be explained by our choice of 60 Hz electricity. 🇺🇸

When the frequency increases, the copper and steel consumptions of the generator and transformer decrease, along with the reduction of weight and cost, but will make the inductances of the electrical equipment and transmission line increase, reduce the capacitances and increase losses, thereby reducing the transmission efficiency. If the frequency is too low, the electrical equipment’s materials will increase, along with heavy and high cost, and will make lights flashing obviously. Practices have proved using 50 Hz and 60 Hz frequencies are appropriate.

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A few years ago my refrigerator stopped working but the outlet was fine. I could get the refrigerator working by plugging in a space heater in my bedroom but the space heater didn’t put out much heat. My electric stove and water heater was working fine. As where my lights and other small appliances.

What was wrong?

Basically, what happened is the power company was working on the line and disconnected the center tap on the utility transformer from the ground temporarily. 240 volts worked fine, and more less loaded half of 120-volt split phase worked normally, while the more loaded half of the phase only passed as much current as the less loaded portion of the split phase.
 
With split phase, if the center tap is disconnected, the maximum amperage that can flow is equal to what is on both sides of the phase. So the heavier load on phase “A” will only be able to pass as much current, and therefore voltage, as phase “B”. If you are pulling 34 amps on phase “A” and 10 amps on phase “B”, the center tap is returning the 24 amps not pulled on phase “B”. No center tap, then phase “A” can only pull 10 amps. As voltage is current times resistance, as the current reduces, so does voltage.
 
So the refrigerator wasn’t getting enough voltage to run, without space heater providing a return path to utility transformer. Split phase transformers rely on their center tap to balance out current between the split phases.