What Is the Power Company Selling?

moving electrons can do work, even if they alternate directions 60 times per sec

Mark

hope you're not a troll and are just curious.

wow! same argument used by Edison against Tesla. AC, where's the power?

the electrons do work moving EACH direction so net work is done.

The utilities company sells you access to power AND power upon demand at an established rate. If you use nothing costs a little. If you use power, costs you the 'access' charge AND the cost of the amount of power you used.

Den onsdag den 26. november 2014 22.55.34 UTC+1 skrev snipped-for-privacy@netplus.com:

the sell you the service of transforming the energy in coal/oil/gas/uran etc. into moving electrons, which is what you need to power your gadgets

when you are riding a bike your legs push and pull, they still provide the power to move the bike forward

-Lasse

Right.

By analogy - consider an old-style two-man cross-cut saw, being used to cut down a tree.

The saw is moving back and forth. There is "no net gain" in the number of teeth on either side of the tree, over time. On average, there are just as many teeth (and just the same ones) sticking out on each side of the tree.

Nevertheless, the tree is still cut down... because each tooth "does work" each time it passes along the tree. It conveys energy, generated by the people who are pushing and pulling on the saw, and delivering it to the wood fibers of the tree (which are sheared through or abraded away, as a result).

Don't think of electrons as the "product being bought". Think of them as the "truck which delivers the product". And, think of each "truck" as being "re-loaded" with energy, each time the 60-cycle electrical field changes direction.

Oddly enough the power company actually sells energy. They should be called an energy company.

--

Rick

Around here most of them have names with "energy", and sell not only electricity but also district heating

-Lasse

Hi Claus,

You are paying the power company to do work at their plant, which work then shows up at your home to, for example, heat up your toaster. If you want to know how this is accomplished, then read up on 'work' in the physics sense of the word, and read a little about electricity and magnetism. Then come back and ask again in terms of what you've learned. It's worth the effort to figure out - definitely one of the neatest things about living in the modern age.

ChesterW

On Wed, 26 Nov 2014 15:05:04 -0700, RobertMacy Gave us:

What all these windmill dorks should do is build a huge, underground megagyro flywheel to store kinetic energy in. Spool that up and keep a few minutes of reserve in it, and a way to push into demand bumps without stressing the wind turbine generator sets. They would all feed into the node which distributes power onto the grid and bangs the gyro to keep it in "free fall". Make a big, several hundred ton gyro, and giant alternators on each axle stub. The spokes would be hollow carbon fiber posts, of course. Place all the gyro's mass at the outer edge.

It would make an ultra-stable generation buffer that would smooth ANY demand pulsations, and be there for an emergency if all else is down.

Far lower maintenance than the hydro driven variety too.

I wonder how spectacular a "dead short" catastrophe in the gyro room would be...

Kind of like exploding shorted batteries.

On Wed, 26 Nov 2014 17:39:19 -0500, rickman Gave us:

Said energy provides power. They sell empowerment.

Our local is called "Sempra Energy". A bunch of overtly greedy bastards.

I would just like to add, that there should be a bit of a WOW factor thrown in here. 320 million people can flip a switch and have this energy light up a room. All the wire that has been strung, the power plants that have been built, the working together to get the whole country in sync. It is amazing to me that it works so well. Then there is the sanitary sewer system, miles and miles of pipes laid underground ending a treatment plant the keeps us from making ourselves ill. Most are oblivious to what happens when they flush the toilet, which is just as well. I am also happy to throw in the story of "I, Pencil"

as confirmation that working in your own self interest helps others too.

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone, Mikek

You're getting access to all the products that plug into the power line. If you don't think much of that, tell them to disconnect you.

But that will wrench the earth off its axis.

On Wed, 26 Nov 2014 16:59:19 -0800, Gyrfalcon Gave us:

Two then, counter-rotating, side by side.

There are flywheel-based UPS systems, but it takes an enormous, super-strong flywheel to store a modest amount of energy.

One cool storage idea is a miles-diameter superconductive coil.

--

John Larkin         Highland Technology, Inc 
picosecond timing   precision measurement  

jlarkin att highlandtechnology dott com 
http://www.highlandtechnology.com

Sometimes they also sell imaginary energy, mostly to industrial users.

--

John Larkin         Highland Technology, Inc 
picosecond timing   precision measurement  

jlarkin att highlandtechnology dott com 
http://www.highlandtechnology.com

Den torsdag den 27. november 2014 02.30.18 UTC+1 skrev John Larkin:

it doesn't want to get out into the real word so it gets stuck in the wires

;)

-Lasse

On Thu, 27 Nov 2014 08:46:54 -0800, snipped-for-privacy@netplus.com Gave us:

What a surprise!

What exactly do you have that you plug in to get to work?

Are you really this dumb?

Yes there is, you absolute idiot. EVERY time you ATTACH a DEVICE (read LOAD) to it, it PROVIDES what the load is "asking for". In BOTH directions! Can you really be that dumb?

Yes. Another element of modern society which you are absolutely clueless about... obviously.

You express a SERIOUS flaw in ANY precept of ANY inkling you think you have about how electronics works.

Except that NOTHING you say has any basis in fact or reality.

Your toaster operates on PURE AC. How does the element heat, if your first claim of no net is correct?

You ain't real bright, boy.

"Current" is a quantisization of ongoing work. It is comprised of a complete conduction path through a load, forced by voltage.

You have all the technical knowledge of "Mathesar".

You certainly appear as if you never, ever will.

I sure hope you will not be claiming to have ever taken an electronics course. If you did, the school should get a serious FAIL citation in their endeavors, and hopefully that is what they gave you..

You'd be surprised. My favorite energy storage idea is an evacuated, buried 55-gal drum containing a solid iron motor. It's almost inherently safe---there's nowhere for the rotor to go. When it turns at 15000 RPM, it stores over 16 kWhr. You can play with the numbers by dropping the numbers in Google search window:

1/2 I omega^2 where I = 0.606 m r^2 , and the rotor is a cylinder approx. 20"dia, 30" high:

0.5*0.606*pi*(10in)^4*30in*(7.87g/cm^3)*(10000*2*pi/60s)^2 in kW*hr

I think you have that right Mikek. It seems like quite an accomplishment to me too - especially since we did it all on our own. I read a book recently you might enjoy about the nature of progress and new ideas. The author has a lot to say about looming problems and the nature of predicting technological progress.

ChesterW