How The Power Gets To The Outlet

[Practical Engineering] is ready to explain how power substations get electricity to you in his latest video, which you can see below.  One of the things we always notice when talking to people either in our community or outside it is that most people have no idea how most of the modern world works.

Ask your non-technical friend to explain how a cell phone works or how a hard drive stores data and you aren’t likely to get a very good answer. However, even most of us are only focused on some particular aspect of electronics. There are a lot of people who hack on robots or radios. The AC power grid,though isn’t something a lot of people work with as a hobby. Do you know exactly what goes on in that substation you pass every day on your commute? If you don’t, you’ll learn something in the video.

Sure we know what transformers and breakers are. But do you know what a recloser is? Do you know all the different functions a substation might have? If not, the video is for you.

If you want to learn more about the kinds of wires you see overhead, we’d did that earlier. In fact, we had a whole series on the electric grid, smart and otherwise.

10 thoughts on “How The Power Gets To The Outlet

  1. > One of the things we always notice when talking to people either in our community or outside it is that most people have no idea how most of the modern world works

    Thanks, I’m now thinking about Scandinavian Airlines Flight 911 with 89 onboard flying into Kennedy Airport on November 9, 1965, at exactly 16 minutes 11 seconds past 5 in the evening. ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XetplHcM7aQ ).

    1. I’ll leave a quote from the first episode of James Burke’s 1978 Connections TV series:
      “Never have so many people understood so little about so much” – and that was said 41 years ago. Would have made a great click bait title for this article :)

      In my mind society on average is heading on a downward spiral towards the one shown in Mike Judge’s 2006 film Idiocracy.

        1. Well to be totally fair, there is probably more English blood in his family tree than the entire Haus Sachsen-Coburg und Gotha (which re-branded in 1917, for some totally unknown).

  2. I’m currently in central America where the power just went out again and was wondering how the power gets delivered. Bored, so i started browsing my rss feeds and find this article. Coincidence? Or is someone watching me? Maybe time for a tinfoil hat!

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