By Benoit Dome / Published on Mon, 2010-04-12 20:11
The presence of electricity in a dwelling involves two kinds of safety risks. The first is the most obvious and direct: the risk for the residents on electro-shock. The second safety risk is indirect and therefore more difficult to map: the risk of electrical faults causing fire.
Those risks can be reduced by the usage of safe electrical appliances and by a responsible behaviour of the residents. However, to make the system humanfail- proof, a proper design of the electrical system in the house is imperative.
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By Isabelle Heriakian / Published on Thu, 2009-12-17 17:51
In this guide, circuit protection is detailed as a way to ensure an installation is safe and functional. This document is concerned primarily with protection against the effects of over-currents and fault currents for property protection, but the improvements presented may also lead to secure people as an indirect benefit. There is a focus on circuit breakers as well as on issues that are likely to arise in circuit maintenance and it takes a systemic approach.
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By Glycon Garcia / Published on Fri, 2009-06-12 08:35
In late 2006, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the International Copper Association, and AES Eletropaulo, an electricity distribution company, embarked as partners on an ambitious project in São Paulo, Brazil to test their integrated approach to slum electrification and loss reduction.
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By Bruno De Wachter / Published on Fri, 2009-05-08 05:30
A YouTube video of the National Fire Protection Association
In the past on this blog, we have shown many pictures of unsafe electrical wiring in the slums of developing countries like Senegal or emerging economies like Brazil. This does not mean however that electrical safety ceased to be an issue in OECD countries. In the USA, the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) recently launched a campaign to show the risk of an inappropriate electrical installation and to promote correct electrical wiring. The campaign includes a Home Wiring guide and a ten minute YouTube video. The video explains how electrical faults can lead to fatal fires and enumerates attention points to make a residential electrical installation safe:
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By Benoit Dome / Published on Mon, 2009-05-04 06:41
The peri-urban electrification programme in Sub Sahara Africa will improve the lives of some 15 million households and over 110 million people. It will create energy efficiencies calculated of over 7% of the region’s current electricity consumption, which is the equivalent of over ~7 million Tonnes of CO2 emissions. Per household the energy efficiencies account for some ~40% of the current consumption, including the savings generated by the upstream improvements.
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By Hans De Keulenaer / Published on Mon, 2009-02-23 08:10
A home owner in The Netherlands bought and moved into a house. After 3 months, he checked the electrical installation (he has an engineering background) and counts his blessings. The picture shows a connection box for a washing machine which was a ticking time bomb. It was only a matter of time before the poor connection caused a fire, for example when the washing machine is running at night and residents are sleeping.
When seeing this picture, I immediately agreed within my own family not to run the washing machine or dryer when we're out of the house.
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By Hans De Keulenaer / Published on Sun, 2009-01-18 14:32
A PSERC Public Tele-Seminar
One of the most significant engineering accomplishments of the 20th century was the electrification of our modern world. While progress has been made in making people aware of the hazards of electricity, approximately five arc flash incidents still occur each day in the United States causing serious injury and/or fatality.
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Home of the Future
By Benoit Dome / Published on Thu, 2008-04-24 02:31
For actors in the building construction market, interested in the new possibilities of electrical technologies for smart living and ageing.
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By Angelo Baggini / Published on Fri, 2008-02-15 15:00
Engineers normally face two tasks when designing earthing systems:
- Obtaining a low earth resistance (impedance) value
- Having a good surface potential distribution (low touch and step voltages)
The properties of the earth electrode arrangement depend significantly upon the earth electrode construction.
This animation shows the most common criteria for choosing schemes for electricity distribution from a technical perspective.
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By Stefan Fassbinder / Published on Sat, 2007-10-13 10:55
During the past 40 years death victims of electrical accidents have dropped from 300 to 68 per year in a developed industrial country like Germany. This is largely a consequence of meticulous standardisation work and a steady increase in electrical safety requirements along with implementation mechanisms of these standards. In order to make similar achievements it would be advisable for other countries to adopt similar standards and let electrical material like this disappear from among the »novelties« presented at trade fairs.
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By Stefan Fassbinder / Published on Fri, 2007-07-13 18:52
Always make sure there is one and only one conductive connection between the N conductor and the PA/PE system within a TN-S installation, even when there are several star points from several sources feeding into the system! Otherwise the beneficial effects of a TN-S system are largely made void.
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By Sergio Ferreira / Published on Tue, 2007-07-10 17:04
The following article is the result of a discussion with Glycon Garcia providing an insight of a project of slum electrification in São Paulo, Brazil. The article is published as an eBook so you can scroll the different pages using the titles bellow. The full article is also available right.
Glycon Garcia, leader of the sustainable electrical energy programme of ICA Latin America and manager of the pilot project, describes the situation in the favela.
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By Stefan Fassbinder / Published on Fri, 2007-07-06 14:05
It also happens at CENELEC meetings: Both N and PE conductors blackened on a French lamp! The crucial question is: How can the PE conductor get charred?
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By Stefan Fassbinder / Published on Sun, 2007-06-24 11:18
They are striving hard at IEC to tell the practicing electrician the substantial difference between a PE and a PEN conductor, but as long as the same coloured adhesive tape can be used to mark either of them, it doesn't matter at all, and the IEC people themselves can feel free use said tape for any other purpose.
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By Stefan Fassbinder / Published on Sat, 2007-06-09 21:29
It does not require any further comment if a photo like this one can be taken during a meeting of a standardisation body devising a standard on electrical safety. Albeit, it also incorporates an accuse against the plug and socket Babylon around the world!
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By Hans De Keulenaer / Published on Mon, 2007-05-07 14:09
Electricity theft is not only a safety hazard, but also leads to excessive consumption, as well as hampering development. Regularising the situation leads to several unexpected benefits.
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By Stefan Fassbinder / Published on Wed, 2006-12-20 01:00
Unfortunately there are - European standards are normally very high-pitched and providing wide safety margins but as soon as there are any substantial technical or engineering changes standards will start to lag behind them because standardising is a time consuming and complicated process, especially since national standards are going to be more and more internationally harmonised. This is an undesirable side effect of the quite advantageous decision to harmonise but there is no faster way to achieve good useable international standards.
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By Hans De Keulenaer / Published on Thu, 2006-07-27 14:28
Lack of protection against direct contact from a tourist attraction in Belgium (fortunately not one with many visitors).
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By Hans De Keulenaer / Published on Sun, 2006-05-14 12:55
A new paper from KULeuven gives an overview of the regulations in 6 European countries on periodic inspection of electricial installations, finding major differences in the designation of authorised electricians, control mechanisms, statutory regulations, conditions for connection, periodic controls, kind of inspection and tax benefits
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