120 V vs. 220 V

[Vlad]

Most of the world is using 220V power, while US is still lagging behind with the shitty 120V, unreliable power.

Could we have some explanations, please???

Best explanation wins a trip to the LA Department of Water and Power in DownTown LA, and also to some of the EDISON International plants on a virtual TOUR. Bring your own 3D glasses/spectacles/shades.

[Butterflies]

Voltage capacity, ie v120 or v220, is determined at electrical power panel. Citizens can call a qualified electrician to upgrade hardware of their v120 power panel to v220 power panel. Fess determined by your choice of qualified professional electrician, call different professionals to get quotes for best price.

Either v120 or v220 use kilowatts and Utility companies charge customers based on kilowatts used.

SCE tollfree_1-800-655-4555_for kilowatts rates
Electricians_your choice_for $ costs associated with hardware upgrade from v120 to v220

[Butterflies]

Few more comments for clarity.....

....v120/v220 general inquiries relate to regional building code standards so City Hall will list building code contact numbers

.....new home construction most likely v220

.....apartment dwellers would request v220 upgrades from their landlords

....home owners upgrading from v120 to v220 would call electrician to upgrade their power panel, and ...need to rewire all their jacks for v220 specifications

[Butterflies]

Please accept my apologies, I just now realized that I misunderstood the original question. Sorry, I answered in haste and commented on 'amps' versus 'voltage'. Oops, duh, lol at my mistake.

To address the voltage question....

Way back in 1908 or thereabouts, there was a Tender for electric services and two companies, Edison and Tesla, engaged in a bidding war for this service contract. Tesla won the bidding war and this is the roo reason why the standards differences between North America AC and European DC.

Edison tendered direct current whereas Tesla tendered alternating current.

We all know there are significant Network architecture differences that impact the consumer's quality service. In DC network architecture, a transmission station sends a kilowatt surge along the line supplying superior QoS within circular geographical radius range. QoS diminishes outside of the radius range given that surge strength diminishes over greater distance from the central transmission.

Conversely, in AC architecture, the central transmission station uses substations and rectifiers to boost the geographical range of the kilowatt current.

DC is static with no moving parts or equipment hand-offs so the QoS is superior as offers reduced margin for error or failure. AC is not as robust because there are many moving parts or equipment hand-offs in service delivery like multiple substations and rectifiers that negatively impact QoS by inherent increased risk of error and handover failures. Will any of us forget the North American grid blackout a few years ago? AC handover failure was proven root cause for this grid failure.

DC is preferred service due to superior QoS. Some examples of North American users of DC service might be large business customers like auto manufactures, government centres, etc who can afford to pay the higher costs associated with owning their own electrical processing plants.

In synopsis, back in 1908, did Tela have a better sales person than Edison? Did the vast geographic range of impact choice between AC vs DC? No one knows for sure and we can only speculate. What is for certain is that North American's regulated infrastructure only offers AC for consumer service and only big buinesss can offord the superior DC service.

This concludes my short story on why North America uses AC instead of the preferred European DC standard of service.

[Vlad]

Dear Butterflies,

Let's not get too technical here.

We all know (or should know, by now), about the frictions between Edison and Teszla.

The point we are trying to make is the fact that US was left behind as far as Electrical grid, just like they were in the AUTO industry.
When the Japanese introduced (early 80's) their smaller, more efficient cars, the US manufacturers decided to delay the upgrade of their production lines, because it interfered with their big/fat checks.
The rest is history.

Same with the electrical grid. They will beat this 120 V in the mouth, till hell freezes over.

A 220 V grid allowed EU to introduce Diesel/Electrical more efficient train engines.
Let's not beat around the bush anymore. A drop of 30-50V on a 220 V grid is nothing, compared to same on a 120V grid.

As far as DC vs AC is concerned, I have no idea how you can repeat the DC (max potency at 65 V) ad infinitum, in order to compare with AC voltage. What you wrote does not make sense.

The only Company that I know of, which uses Edison's grid is the BIG MA BELL. The whole 120 VAC grid can go down, while MABELL can still kick in 65 VDC, and keep our landline phones alive. All this, because of Edison, God bless his soul.

BTW, is it not true that Canada uses 220 VAC???

A friend of ours mentioned the fact that EU was somehow lucky, after 2 World Wars. Since both wars were fought over Europe, EUROPEAN countries had to rebuild their whole INFRASTRUCTURE.

They did it. More modern, more flexible than anything, anywhere else in the world.

Any comments??