The technology just wasn't there to make full use of DC. For long distance transmission, it beats AC but dropping it down from transmission to distribution and then to household voltages was very lossy. With the new solid state converter stations, it's very efficient and it makes transformation much easier if you are going between countries. The big HVDC line in New England is 900 KV. +450KV and -450 KV. It keeps things balanced and allows the use of smaller insulator strings.
Bill KB1MGH ________________________________ From: lenaw12 <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Thu, August 26, 2010 11:27:24 AM Subject: [Repeater-Builder] Re: DC Electrical Systems That IS interesting...the story behind the success of the Niagra Falls power plant was that Tesla was able to get his AC to travel far enough to feed Buffalo while Edison's DC wouldn't reach that far, so Tesla "won" the contract... NYC was powered by ConEdison and was therefore supplied with Edison's DC at 110v. Thus a market for the AA5 (all American 5) AC/DC tube radios. A million volts sounds like it might have solved the distance problems... LW --- In [email protected], petedcur...@... wrote: > > Actually DC is the latest thing in power transmission. The gigantic Itaipu > Hydroelectric plant is located on the River border between Paraguay & Brazil > and thus a shared project. Paraguay is 50HZ and Brazil is 60HZ. As such > half the Alternators are 50HZ and the other half are 60HZ. But most of the > generated power goes to Brazil. The 50HZ & 60HZ AC is converted to DC and > sent by a 1 million volt DC transmission line to Brazil then converted back > to 60HZ in Brazil. > > Peter ------------------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Links http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
