Huh? It's only 5:30AM here and I just got up but, the ONLY time you
aren't consuming power is at the zero crossing of the voltage and
current sine waves (assuming a purely resistive load where I and E are
in phase). Since you are paying for power, which is P=I X E, during the
negative half cycle, you have, for example, -168 Volts X -1 Amp = +168
Watts...try it on a calculator...negative times a negative is positive.

Scott

Paul Burridge wrote:
On Fri, 12 Nov 2004 13:56:34 GMT, (Don
Pearce) wrote:


You don't get billed for current, you get billed for energy - in the
UK the measure is the kilowatt hour.


Hey, whose side are you on? ;-)


Multiply your voltage by your
current instant by instant, take the average (gives you power) and
multiply that by the duration in hours and you have your consumption.


They don't bill me instant-by-instant; they bill me for the power they
claim I've used over the course of a three-monthly period. Since power
is the product of voltage and current (and I've proved earlier that
both are zero) I'm being charged for electricity that I've not
actually used. The current goes in and out of the house unchanged.
It's all returned to the power company. All I've done is borrow it.
And you can bet that when they get their current back they don't just
dump it to ground; oh no. They re-sell it again and again and again to
other suckers like me. We're all paying multiple sums for the *same*
lousy current that's probably been circulating for years.
The power companies have been scamming us for decades! I can't believe
I've only just woken up to it.

Well, you can look at it this way...It's basically a series circuit,
from generator, through all customer houses, and back to the generator.
You may be returning ALMOST all of the current coming into your house,
minus resistive losses, but if you divert that voltage and current
through one of your appliances, the voltage and current (hence power)
will actually be doing some work. Electricity, while being USED in your
house, is like an employee of YOURS...it is doing WORK, so legally you
must pay the worker's wages for work performed. Just be glad you don't
have to pay it's social security taxes, fed and state taxes, health
insurance, worker's comp insurance premiums, 401K contributions, etc.
Starts to make electricity (employee) sound cheap.

Scott


Paul Burridge wrote:



Sorry, Don, you obviously haven't thought this through. Since *all*
their current is returned, I cannot have used *any* of it. Whatever
the voltage might be, multiplying it by zero Amps still gives zero
power!

"William J. Beaty" wrote in message
om...
Paul Burridge wrote in message
. ..

On the other hand, the path for electrical energy is one way. The
electric companies send electromagnetic energy over enormous distances.
It's this energy which your appliances consume. Unfortunately for
our definition of "electricity," this energy is composed of electric and
magnetic fields, and it travels in the space surrounding the wires.
Do we really want to state that electricity is made of EM fields?
Do we really want to say that no electricity travels inside of wires,
but instead it travels in the space outside? If we say that electricity
is a form of energy, that's the same as saying that electricity is
just some travelling waves of electromagnetic field.

Yes please, guided energy!. It seems fathomable and sits easily amongst
waveguides, aerials, lightbulbs and triphasic conduit.
Electrons have a bit of weight. If you spin a metal disc at the power
station fast enough, then all the electrons in it should centrifuge out and
crowd towards the outer edge leaving no electrons in the middle. The
electrons aren't happy being herded onto the outer rim and really just want
to hang out and chew the cud. The potential to do work has thus been stored,
just like in a flywheel.
Paul switches on his TV and gives them a route back to the disc centre. The
stored disc energy is immediately translated in his TV to heat, light and
sound as the electrons all work through to become nonentities again.
The power station people don't like this as all their patiently herded
electrons have escaped, the disc has slowed a tad and they have to raise
more steam to maintain speed and herd more electrons. Hence will charge
Paul handsomely for his profligacy.
Dunno what happens in a spinning capacitor with diode connected plates
though :-)
regards
john

On Sat, 13 Nov 2004 11:42:11 +0000, Scott
wrote:

Huh? It's only 5:30AM here and I just got up but, the ONLY time you
aren't consuming power is at the zero crossing of the voltage and
current sine waves (assuming a purely resistive load where I and E are
in phase). Since you are paying for power, which is P=I X E, during the
negative half cycle, you have, for example, -168 Volts X -1 Amp = +168
Watts...try it on a calculator...negative times a negative is positive.

Thanks, Scott. So you're basically agreeing with me. I owe the power
co. for the positive cycles they send me; they owe *me* for the
negative ones. Since they are equal and opposite, they cancel each
other out. Overall, then, zero billing justified.
We are being conned!!!
--

"What is now proved was once only imagin'd." - William Blake, 1793.

On Fri, 12 Nov 2004 19:37:28 -0500, **THE-RFI-EMI-GUY**
wrote:

Paul; You could drive ground rods into opposite corners of your property
and extract some of the power from the earth and run your house for
nothing at all! In fact If you dig a deep enough trench in the middle,
you could isolate the ground and get a bigger return current!

Well, I don't see how that could work, but I had considered digging a
trench around my boundary and thereby cutting off the return path for
the other users' behind my house and demanding payment from the power
co. to re-instate it. But then it's obvious the return current's only
going to go deeper underground or around my property. It seems there's
nothing I can do to make any dough out of this. :-(
--

"What is now proved was once only imagin'd." - William Blake, 1793.

Paul Burridge wrote:
On Sat, 13 Nov 2004 11:42:11 +0000, Scott
wrote:


Huh? It's only 5:30AM here and I just got up but, the ONLY time you
aren't consuming power is at the zero crossing of the voltage and
current sine waves (assuming a purely resistive load where I and E are
in phase). Since you are paying for power, which is P=I X E, during the
negative half cycle, you have, for example, -168 Volts X -1 Amp = +168
Watts...try it on a calculator...negative times a negative is positive.


Thanks, Scott. So you're basically agreeing with me. I owe the power
co. for the positive cycles they send me; they owe *me* for the
negative ones. Since they are equal and opposite, they cancel each
other out. Overall, then, zero billing justified.
We are being conned!!!

You might have a case if the ac feed was a single line- but the
so-called negative cycle is a relative polarity- they draw current out
of your hot connection by supplying it to the neutral. They vector sum
of the two currents they deliver is zero at all times- so you pay for
them to maintain an undulating line voltage with constant RMS magnitude
across your house.

Paul Burridge wrote:

The power company run a line to my house. They supply me with
electricity. This amounts to a 230V, 65A facility at the distribution
board in a cupboard under the stairs.

!!!!!

I run all my stuff from that
board. The board contains several RCBOs that trip-out in the event of
any leakage current being sensed. If current in = current out; they're
happy and won't trip. Because they don't trip out, I conclude I don't
use any current.
The voltage supplied is 230VAC RMS.

!!!!!

Since this is alternating between
equal positive and negative half-cycles, the average level of this
voltage supply is zero.
I use no current and they effectively supply no voltage. Why do I get
billed for electricity usage when I clearly can't have used any?

I hope you should know the answer. It involves a square term.

Have you tried measuring the voltage.

No European countries run on 230V to the best of my knowledge.


Graham

On Fri, 12 Nov 2004 23:18:28 GMT, Rich The Philosophizer
wrote:

Please forgive my naivete, but this is a joke, right?

It's a "thought-provoking metaphysical discussion." Care to
participate? ;-)
--

"What is now proved was once only imagin'd." - William Blake, 1793.

On 13 Nov 2004 00:15:19 GMT, PAMNO (N2EY) wrote:

In article , Paul Burridge
writes:

I use no current and they effectively supply no voltage. Why do I get
billed for electricity usage when I clearly can't have used any?

Simple.

Electrons come into your house (supplied by the utility) and then they go back
out.

You don't buy them - you just pay rent for the time you have them.

Well then I'm *definitely* being swindled; my bills make no mention of
electrons at all.
--

"What is now proved was once only imagin'd." - William Blake, 1793.

On Sat, 13 Nov 2004 16:27:45 +0000, Pooh Bear
wrote:

No European countries run on 230V to the best of my knowledge.

British mains electricity used to be 240V, until the EU spit!
'harmonised' the level across EUrope to 230V. Unless of course, you
know better....
--

"What is now proved was once only imagin'd." - William Blake, 1793.