In message
-septem
ber.org, at 20:28:20 on Sat, 4 Apr 2015, Recliner
remarked:
Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at
11:51:44 on Sat, 4 Apr 2015, remarked:
They're more common than reported. We had one round the corner a few
months back in a suburban street. One theory is that the profusion of
electrical gadgets in homes, computer system in offices etc, are
overloading the cables, that in many cases are often old and cannot take the
current fluctuations.

And people seriously expect to be able to charge up more than a trivial
number of electric cars, on top of all that lot???

Not many people -- sales of pure EVs are still derisory. It's more a case
of the government and certain car companies pushing them at us.

The electric-car advocates seem to think we can just go out and buy
them, plug them in and become greener-than-green overnight.

Also, I
think the expectation is that EVs would be charging mainly in the off-peak.

When there's no solar energy input.

There's certainly a lot more gadgets in use, but I don't see why
fluctuations would stress cables.

I'd read that as not being able to take peaks in excess of their
original design.

In any case, many of those devices are drawing a tiny current when
they're "off", waiting to be turned on with a remote control, or
charging phone/tablet batteries.

Loads of PCs, monitors, printers, photocopiers etc are switched on.

Surely that load is less than the electric heating load that used to be
common before most people switched to gas?

When we first moved into a certain office block in Brentwood, despite
being 60's build, there were only two ring mains for each 4,000 sqft
floor - enough to run a few electric typewriters perhaps. Having plugged
in numerous PCs and similar stuff, we were initially a bit surprised
that the breakers went if someone also turned on an electric kettle.
--
Roland Perry