The Cost Of Nothing
Webber | 14.05.2007 17:04
Power stations dotted about to supply electricity to the grid,some in France are uneconomical and designed to cost us more.To send electricity along wire over distance requires much higher voltages than are reqiured at the destinations.Loss is due to resistence,suspected at being near to 20% along overhead cable and even more below ground.To generate the higher voltages requires more fuel.In gas or coal fired power stations this increases green house gases.It is suspected as much as a quarter of electricity generated is lost during distribution.A cost we have to foot.The technology is almost as old as the discovery of electricity and no one seems to be intrested in changing it.Why could this be?It's very simple.Electricity generation has more than one power.It has corporate power.A power held by a few.Who have a vested intrest in controlling centralised generation,with it's loss.I can remember once being asked by a factory owner if i could install a generator.When i got to his factory i was surprised to see he had an old wartime genny,they look like an elongated compressor that you see with pnumatic drills.He was concerned it may not be powerful enough to run his small concern I told him it was capable of running the whole industrial estate.My point is the local generation of power is economical and is not subject to power loss.To have disconnected his generator from it's diesel engine and to connect it to water power would have been a simple process,he had a stream near by.There is no need for huge power stations.And no need for corporate owners.
Webber
Comments
Display the following 25 comments