Power systems theory - generation, transmissions and distribution
Many questions sent in to the site are in connection with motor starting and in particular star-delta. For all but the simplest application, there is merit in performing a more detailed study.&... read more..
Traditionally substations have used circuit breakers, current transformers (CT), voltage transformers (VT) and protection relays all wired together using copper cables. With advances in digital... read more..
Modelica is an open source (free) software language for modelling complex systems. Having never used it before, I thought I would download a development platform and see how it stacked up. This... read more..
Within Europe the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC) has standardised the both the designation and colour of cables. These are published in CENELEC document... read more..
A UPS is an uninterruptible power supply. It is a device which maintains a continuous supply of electrical power, even in the event of failure of the mains (utility) supply. A UPS is inst... read more..
Power cables can basically be classified into earthed and unearthed cables, where earthed and unearthed refer to the application for which the cable is used. Earthed system refers to a three phase syste... read more..
Photovoltaic (PV) cells (sometimes called solar cells) convert solar energy into electrical energy. Every year more and more PV systems are installed. With this growing application, it's ... read more..
Fire resistant and fire retardant cable sheaths are design to resist combustion and limit the propagation of flames. Low smokes cables have a sheath designed to limit the amount of smoke and toxic ha... read more..
Capacitors have numerous applications in electrical and electronic applications. This note examines the use of capacitors to store electrical energy. The sidebar shows details of a typical c... read more..
If two dissimilar metals are touching and an external conducting path exists, corrosion of one the metals can take place. Moisture or other materials acting as an electrolyte between the metals... read more..
While not as popular as it once was, frame leakage protection does still have some use in some circumstances. In essence frame leakage is an earth fault type protection. A current transfo... read more..
Ever wondered what kind of power an aircraft uses when parked at the airport stand.
Normally the aircraft generates it own power, but when parked with the engines switched off power provided ... read more..
When looking at the design of a lighting scheme it is useful to have an understanding on the nature of light itself and some of the basic theory associated...
This is the first of two posts on the resistance of conductors. In the next post I will look at the ac resistance, including skin effect and we deal with...
Photovoltaic (PV) systems are typically more efficient when connected in parallel with a main power gird. During periods when the PV system generates energy...
A lot of our members work in countries where PPE (personal protective equipment) is regulated or they work for companies/organizations which take employee...
Some colleagues had an issue earlier in the week on sizing conduits to be cast in concrete for some power cables . It became clear that none of us had...
Working in the vicinity of electrical equipment poses an hazard. In addition to electric shock hazard, fault currents passing through air causes Arc Flash...
Before the technical, some general information. E-ink display are found in a lot of e-readers, some mobile phones and similar devices and the intent is...
It wasn't so long ago I was telling someone that I don't use rules of thumb as most things are easily calculated anyhow. As it turns out I last week...
The International System of Units (abbreviated SI) is the world's most widely used system of units. The system consists of a set of units and prefixes...
Tapping your forearm or hand with a finger could soon be the way you interact with gadgets. A new technology created by Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon ...
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