What would a clean-sheet set of wiring regulations look like today?

It is an interesting thought experiment to consider how things might have been done differently if it wasn't for historical accident..

Years ago we weren't that fussed about ADS, just made sure that everything was solidly earthed. If we'd continued down that line we might now have c.p.c.s that a 4x the c.s.a. of the line conductors (so even during earth faults exposed parts remain below 50V) and probably concentric earth cables (perhaps think SWA but with copper armour strands) so far less reliance on RCDs etc.

Part of the idea behind ring circuits was instead of having multiple final circuits, you run the distribution circuit to the socket and have a final circuit for each appliance (far better discrimination, and better use of resources as copper is shared between different uses, making the best use of diversity). Ideal when you want lots of sockets for relatively low power appliances. Had we carried on in that vein, especially with the vast increase in the number of appliances, we might have ended up with domestics based on something more like flush dado bus-bar trunking with sockets just clipped in where ever they're wanted, no lighting circuits, just a FCU in each room for the lights, and possibly high demand appliances like cookers and showers tapping into the same system. So no CU as such, just one or two big fuses (maybe one per floor).

  - Andy.

It is an interesting thought experiment to consider how things might have been done differently if it wasn't for historical accident..

Years ago we weren't that fussed about ADS, just made sure that everything was solidly earthed. If we'd continued down that line we might now have c.p.c.s that a 4x the c.s.a. of the line conductors (so even during earth faults exposed parts remain below 50V) and probably concentric earth cables (perhaps think SWA but with copper armour strands) so far less reliance on RCDs etc.

Part of the idea behind ring circuits was instead of having multiple final circuits, you run the distribution circuit to the socket and have a final circuit for each appliance (far better discrimination, and better use of resources as copper is shared between different uses, making the best use of diversity). Ideal when you want lots of sockets for relatively low power appliances. Had we carried on in that vein, especially with the vast increase in the number of appliances, we might have ended up with domestics based on something more like flush dado bus-bar trunking with sockets just clipped in where ever they're wanted, no lighting circuits, just a FCU in each room for the lights, and possibly high demand appliances like cookers and showers tapping into the same system. So no CU as such, just one or two big fuses (maybe one per floor).

  - Andy.