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Why are Power Grids so Large?

Former Community Member
Former Community Member
Why are power systems so large and interconnected? For example, what technical obstacles prevents the US eastern interconnection from being 8 isolated islands? Why not separate them by ISO/RTO? Why does every power grid in the world strive to be as large as geography allows?


Better yet why not have scattered power plants about (with redundancies of course) feeding load radially? A lot simpler and a lot less to go wrong.

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    The UK formerly used many different frequencies including 12 cycles, 15, 16.67, 25, 33.3, 40, 50, 60 and 100 cycles, and others. The Weir report recommended a new standard of 50 cycles, based on this being the highest frequency already in widespread use. Higher frequency supplies existed but were never popular. 50 cycles was also considered to be the lowest frequency suitable for domestic lighting. At less than 50 cycles lamp flicker becomes obtrusive especially on low power lamps.

    The lower frequency supplies were primarily for electric power, not for lighting. Factories with a low frequency power supply tended to either use gas lighting, or a separate DC supply for lighting. Another option was 6 volt vehicle headlight lamps worked from transformers, these tended not to flicker due to the very thick filaments.


    IIRC Lynmouth had a 100 cycle supply until 1952 when the local power station was destroyed by the great flood.
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    The UK formerly used many different frequencies including 12 cycles, 15, 16.67, 25, 33.3, 40, 50, 60 and 100 cycles, and others. The Weir report recommended a new standard of 50 cycles, based on this being the highest frequency already in widespread use. Higher frequency supplies existed but were never popular. 50 cycles was also considered to be the lowest frequency suitable for domestic lighting. At less than 50 cycles lamp flicker becomes obtrusive especially on low power lamps.

    The lower frequency supplies were primarily for electric power, not for lighting. Factories with a low frequency power supply tended to either use gas lighting, or a separate DC supply for lighting. Another option was 6 volt vehicle headlight lamps worked from transformers, these tended not to flicker due to the very thick filaments.


    IIRC Lynmouth had a 100 cycle supply until 1952 when the local power station was destroyed by the great flood.
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