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132 comments on DrumBeat: September 30, 2007

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AlanfromBigEasy on September 30, 2007 - 6:43pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Just back from DC a few hours ago.

HV DC cannot be used directly to operate trains (Low Voltage DC 600 V to 3 kV DC, is used, but 500 kV DC cannot be transformed down to usable DC voltages).

I have heard that US railroads East of the Mississippi should be electrified at 25 kV AC, and 50 kV AC West of the Mississippi and in Canada.

One can push these voltages only a few dozen miles, so a high voltage feeder is required.

One thought (not my area of expertise) is 500 kV DC in the corridor with "drops" (inverters to AC) every hundred miles or so to 150 kV AC which is then transformed to train voltage (25 or 50 kV AC) every dozen or two miles.

Using rail corridors for electrical transmission is a substantial value added to rail electrification.

Best Hopes

Alan

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old hermit on September 30, 2007 - 7:10pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

One thought (not my area of expertise) is 500 kV DC in the corridor with "drops" (inverters to AC) every hundred miles or so to 150 kV AC which is then transformed to train voltage (25 or 50 kV AC) every dozen or two miles.

I would definately like to see someone answer this question. Most of the transmission voltages out here in the west are.
500KVAC
345KVAC
230KVAC
115KVAC
and 69KVAC down to distribution voltages.

I doubt seriously HVDC will be used much out here in the west due to all the varying HVAC lines already in existance. Not to mention that those "Inverters" if they make them at that voltage aren't going to be cheap.

old hermit

"you can cure ignorance, but you can't educate stupitidy"

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AlanfromBigEasy on September 30, 2007 - 9:04pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

There is already the Pacific Intertie HV DC in operation from The Dalles outside Portland OR to Los Angeles.

Northern Lights proposes an HV DC line from Ft. McMurray to San Francisco and another twin line from Montana (one leg) and Wyoming (other leg) to Las Vegas where it splits into legs to Los Angeles and Phoenix.

Sweden runs a complex grid mixture of HV AC & HV DC transmission lines. Mix & match works well.

Alan

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hardhat on October 1, 2007 - 12:26am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

If HVDC lines are used in the Los Angeles area, could stray leakage from the lines be used to ionize the air so that smog particles would charge up and head for the ground?

AFAIK, this would be very similar to the cleansing effect a good electrical storm would do.

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pondlife on October 1, 2007 - 5:58am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

I hope not - they could stick to your lungs at ground potential.

I would like to know whatever happened to the HV power line vs humans debate. It raged for a decade with conflicting results until some brightspark decided to include wind direction and bingo it was not the fields which made you bad, it was the drift of charged airborne crap that poisons you. Since that very logical result was suggested there has been no MSM reporting of results, no data that I have read [and I do read EEngineering texts]. Is the truth out there??

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hardhat on October 5, 2007 - 2:15pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Thanks for the insight on the charged particle theory - it sounds a helluva lot more plausible to me than the field theory about getting sick around power lines.

If ANYONE gets sick from fields, I should have been among the first in line. I have been playing with RF, high voltage, and magnetism since I was in elementary school. Neither me, nor any of the like-minded friends that have the same affliction for this kind of technology have noted any increased likelihood of our demise from messing around with our toys, albeit we have all definitely noted our type do not attract women, nor do we develop the kind of "people skills" required to stay employed in a corporate environment. But then, we are not trying all that hard to be richer than everyone else or reproduce. Physics, not politics, is the "video game" of addiction for me.

I saw how fast I could clear a room of tobacco smoke using nothing more than a few parts I scrounged from an old TV. I noted how fast I could make all the cigarette smoke in the room head for some tinfoil suspended from the ceiling suspended from fishing line. It cleaned the air but made a really sticky mess on the tinfoil. All it took was a few -5KV emitters and one big +20KV "attractor".

If some old TV flybacks barely loaded would clear a room like that, I could just imagine using power lines for emitters, and placing a few "attractors" where I wanted the majority of the airborne gooey stuff to go.

Steve

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