Electric power

“ The company, needing electric power for its own use, has developed a system deriving its power from a point about thirty miles from the city, where a small stream plunges down the sea coast from the mountain range that runs along it. ”

“ Thus, a one kilowatt plant permits the use of any one of these lamp circuit devices at a time, with a few lights in addition.
Power
Electric power is to be had through motors. A direct current dynamo and a direct current motor are identical in construction. That is, a motor becomes a generator if belted to power; and a generator becomes a motor, if connected to electric mains. ”

“ Owing to the high relative cost of electric power when generated in small amounts and the great advantages of generating it in proximity to coal mines and waterfalls, the supply of electric power in bulk to small towns and manufacturing districts has become a great feature in modern electrical engineering. ”

“ Electrical energy may be transmitted around the world if the line voltage is unlimited. This follows from the law that a given power may be transmitted to any distance with constant efficiency and a fixed weight of conductors, provided the voltage is increased directly with the distance.
The physical limits of electric-power transmission are thus fixed by the practicable voltage that may be employed. The effects of the voltage of transmission must be met in the apparatus at generating and receiving stations on the one hand, and along the line on the other. ”

“ By means of electricity the work, not only of factories, but also of the home and the farm may be done in any place where electricity can be installed. We must bear in mind that electricity is never a source of power, but is only the agent that carries power to the user. The source of all electric power is either steam or water, produced by water-wheels, turbines, steam-engines or gas-engines. The economical way to furnish electric power is to establish central power plants, and electricity may be conveyed from them for many miles. ”

“ COST OF CONDUCTORS FOR ELECTRIC-POWER TRANSMISSION.
Electrical transmission of energy involves problems quite distinct from its development. A great water-power, or a location where fuel is cheap, may offer opportunity to generate electrical energy at an exceptionally low cost. ”

“ The electrical transmission of power is exemplified in everything which is based on the generation of electricity. The ordinary electric light is power coming from a generator in the building or a public street-dynamo.
However, when we talk in general terms of electric transmission we mean the transmission of energy on a large scale by means of overhead or underground conductors to a considerable distance and the transformation of this energy into light and heat and chemical or mechanical power to carry on the processes of work and industry. ”

“ As it is a law of every electric circuit that the rate of transformation of electric energy to heat or work in each of its several parts is directly proportional to the drop of voltage therein, it follows that a drop of 500 or 1,000 or 2,000 volts in the conductors of a 10,000-volt transmission line at full load would correspond to a power loss of five to ten or twenty per cent respectively. ”

“ The generator of the electric current, which is stored away in some out-of-the-way corner, is probably a small so-called "dry-cell" which you could readily carry around in your pocket; or it may consist of a receptacle holding a pint or two of liquid in which some metal plates are immersed. Such an apparatus seems scarcely more than a toy when we contrast it with the gigantic dynamos of the power-house; yet, within the limits of its capacities, one is as surely a generator of electricity as the other. ”

“ In the public supply of electric power in this country, the usual practice is to use alternating-current generators in the power stations, and to transmit the power at a high voltage to substations. The substation plant reduces the pressure to a value suitable to the consumer, and in many instances also converts the alternating current into direct current. From the substations the power is distributed to the consumers. ”

“ The quantity of electricity passed by a current of one ampere in one
hour. It is used by electric power and lighting companies as the unit of
energy supplied by them, because they maintain a constant potential
difference in their leads, so that only the amperes and hours need
measuring or recording to give the energy, viz. : volt-ampere-hours.
The same unit is applied to batteries to indicate their potential
energy, because they also are assumed to be of constant voltage or
electro-motive force. ”

“ Of the feasibility of economically distributing the electric current there is a growing confidence among electricians, and the advantages of so transmitting power have been frequently urged of late, not only for moving light machinery, but for doing all the work now done in our factories by the steam-engine. ”

“ Indeed, a close examination will show that wherever power is expended in developing current in a circuit, cutting lines of force, the energy expended is first employed in stretching the lines, which thus receive the energy required to permit them, in shortening, to cut the conductor and set up currents in the electric circuit in accordance with the potential difference developed in that circuit and its resistance. ”

“ Now, electricity is a very exact science. There is no mere theory about it; and a unit is a definite quantity of power, known in that science as a “kilowatt hour.” Thus, a kilowatt, or 1,000 watts, is the equivalent in measured work of 11⁄3 horse-power, equal to the lifting of 44,000 lbs. per minute, or the doing of so many units of work, either electric lighting, heating, machinery driving, or traction. ”

“ As a very natural consequence of such development, the company by 1902 had 420 miles of underground system supplying installation amounting to 1,928,090 fifty-watt equivalents.
Electricity a Living Factor.
To talk about electrical development in terms of power consumed tells but one side of the story. More impressive even than figures are the immense number of uses to which electricity is put. Electric lighting, introduced in 1882, has become practically the standard for illumination, not only here, but for the entire civilized world. ”

“ As a partial offset to the low cost of the continuous-current generators and to the absence of transformers, there is the necessity for motor-generators in a sub-station when current for lighting as well as power is to be distributed. ”

“ The rapid progress that has been made of late years in the application of electricity to industrial purposes, and particularly in the transmission of power by means of the electric motor, has made it imperative for every engineer who wishes to keep up to date to have some knowledge of the way electrical currents are controlled and used for practical purposes. ”

“ Available voltages for continuous- and alternating-current transmissions are thus on a practically equal footing as to their upper limit. The amount of power that may be generated and delivered with either the alternating- or continuous-current system of transmission is practically unlimited. ”

“ A much more effective and generally adopted method of regulation of voltage at the generating plants of transmission systems is based on the action of an attendant who varies the current in the magnet coils of each generator so as to raise or lower its voltage as desired. ”

“ Having decided on the amount of power and the voltage and length of the transmission, the required weight of conductors will vary inversely as the percentage of energy lost as heat in the line. The best percentage [22] of loss depends on the number of factors, some of which, such as the cost of energy at the generating plant, are peculiar to each case. ”

“ Before I dismiss this interesting topic, I would ask whether the transmission of the power called electric, to a particular spot, does not always afford evidence, that at that spot there exists, beneath the surface of the earth, either a vein of metallic ore, a spring, or some other competent conductor, which the power called electric is seeking to reach, when the antagonist non-conductors exhibit their destructive phenomena? ”

“ A pure lighting service tends toward the larger ratio between the average and maximum load, while a larger motor capacity along with the lamps, tends to reduce the ratio. Furthermore, by far the greater part of the energy output of an electrical supply system during each twenty-four hours must be delivered between noon and midnight. ”

“ The advantages of the electric light and of the distribution of power by electricity have lately been recognized by the British Government, who have just passed a bill through Parliament to facilitate the establishment of electrical conductors in towns, subject to certain regulating clauses to protect the interests of the public and of local authorities. ”

“ There are many small electric lighting plants which furnish current from sundown to midnight only at fifteen cents per kilowatt hour, with little profit. The transformer (Fig. 127) makes it possible to gather all this generation of electricity for sparsely settled districts into large central stations, located sometimes far away from the consumer perhaps, where there is abundant power in some water-fall, thus saving the expense of coal for running the dynamos. ”

“ A great deal is being spoken of substituting steam plant by electricity, and of utilising waterfalls, etc., for obtaining electric motor power. In order to distribute correctly the electrical energy obtained, it is of course necessary to estimate, weigh and measure where and how much of this energy is to be directed, so as to derive the greatest possible advantage therefrom. ”

“ Personally, I think that four hundred years hence the power question in England may be solved somewhat as follows: The country will be covered with rows of metallic windmills working electric motors which in their turn supply current at a very high voltage to great electric mains. ”

“ Now, therefore, I, Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States, under and by virtue of the powers vested in me by the foregoing resolutions and statute, and by virtue of all other powers thereto me enabling, do hereby, through Newton D. Baker, Secretary of War, take possession and assume control at 12 o'clock noon on the twenty-eighth day of December, 1917, of each and every system of transportation and the appurtenances thereof located wholly or in part within the boundaries of the continental United States and consisting of railroads, and owned or controlled systems of coastwise and inland transportation, engaged in general transportation, whether operated by steam or by electric power, including also terminals, terminal companies and terminal associations, sleeping and parlor cars, private cars and private car lines, elevators, warehouses, telegraph and telephone lines and all other equipment and appurtenances commonly used upon or operated as a part of such rail or combined rail and water systems of transportation, to the end that such systems of transportation be utilized for the transfer and transportation of troops, war material and equipment to the exclusion so far as may be necessary of all other traffic thereon, and that so far as such exclusive use be not necessary or desirable, such systems of transportation be operated and utilized in the performance of such other services as the national interest 140may require and of the usual and ordinary business and duties of common carriers. ”

“ Louis for the lighting by electricity of certain public streets and alleys thereof; that to effect such distribution it is necessary to transmit through and by means of said wires electric currents of great power, which, if and when accidentally diverted, are dangerous to human life and property ”

“ We shall have wires laid along every street, tapped into every house, as gas-pipes are at present; we shall have the quantity of electricity used in each house registered, as gas is at present, and it will be passed through little electric machines to drive machinery, to produce ventilation, to replace stoves and fires, to work apple-parers and mangles and barbers' brushes, among other things, as well as to give everybody an electric light. ”

“ It was at first the chemist who emancipated electricity for new and myriad uses. His successor to-day is the engineer, who wins his spurs by bringing his generator to practical perfection, by improving his steam and gas engines to double their efficiency of thirty years ago. If to the engineer and mechanic the electric art owes much, magnificently has the debt been repaid. As we discover in replacing at our street door an old-fashioned moving bell pull by an electric wire armed with a push button, electricity transmits motion without movement of its conductor as a mass. ”

“ Even the power which lurks in every coal-scuttle, shines in the electric lamp, pants in the motor-omnibus, declares itself in the ineffable wonders of reproduction and growth, is supersensual. ”

“ It is this energy which, by the action of the machine, is converted into the potential energy represented by the electric field surrounding the two electrodes. To increase the charge it is customary to connect the electrodes with the knobs of two Ley den jars, since by the use of a condenser the quantity of electricity, which can be accumulated with a given difference of potential, is greatly augmented. That energy is used in producing electrification is distinctly felt when working the machine by hand. ”