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

Standardisation of wiring colours would be a useful step. Green/Yellow for ground/earth is almost there but the rest of the colours are scattered in function between the different countries. If I remove a light fitting in my Swiss apartment I may find a black wire and a yellow wire. The black is phase, the yellow is neutral. 

Redefining any of the current colours would merely increase the already huge legacy problem 

I thought countries were harmonising colours, hence the change to UK wiring some year back. Is the Swiss example their original legacy / pre-harmonisation colouring?

One observation I'd make on international practices, is we focus on wiring colours but there's also differences on cabling requirements and practices generally - flat-form / twin and earth cabling vs. round NYY-J in many European countries. 

Practices on armoring differ considerably, routine in Britain but not widely used in other European countries, with different approaches using metallic sheaths within the cable.

yes modern Swiss wiring is harmonised colours, and has been since 2005 or so, except for switched lives to lights, and remote switched sockets for table lamps, that tend to be something circuit specific from a list of 'not the other colours' .

And of course, like red and black here there will be some old colours in the walls that last more or less for ever, -  probably until the building is demolished in some cases.
 
As for nails, and if you really needed to armour or not, at least one Swiss sparks is looking into it for fun in an experimental way,

https://elektricks.com/nagel-im-kabel-wann-schuetzt-der-schutzleiter/

looks like a typically Germanic test rig.

I don't think its bad  not to associate the same colour with a certain function each time- it encourages checking, which is good. 'Knowing' that say red is earth (old German practice) or live (as it was here) is not always sensible when you meet kit wired in the other place.

M. 

How far would we go with these new regulations? Should they be world wide, USA, China etc. where even Green/Yellow hasn't made it yet.

Plugs and sockets is another fun area. There are two different use areas:

1) Low current electronics etc. where the Europlug  is much more practical that the BS1363 plug (most things are more practical than heavy, fused, square pin plug.

2) Long duration higher current loads e.g. EV charging, possibly balcony solar where again the fused BS1363 tends to suffer.

The <240W case is solved by USB - there is no value in attempting another standard there.

I think the >3kW case is too diverse to support much in the way of standardisation, other than the automotive charging case which is driven by worldwide standardisation and thus outside the scope of the original discussion of the wiring regs.

Well, as I suggested earlier in this discussion (buried somewhere up above now), we could just use  IEC 62196 'Type 2' sockets for all big loads. After all, EV standardisation means that compatible components will be widely available and produced in huge numbers.

The sockets aren't that big and if you strip away the stuff not strictly required such as smart charger functionality, they probably wouldn't meaningfully drive up costs.

It can do loads up to 70/80A single phase and 3x63A three phase and can signal its actual rating to the attached load using PWM.

Hi,

I don't think the battle between AC and DC charging for EVs has finished yet - the IEC 62196 connector might not have a long term future.

DC has clearly won for higher power charging.

Domestically, if you could charge your car twice as fast, didn't have to pay for a £500 built in charger option and had the possibility of V2G operation, how much would you pay for a home DC charger?    How.much would it cost to make a 15kW bi-directional inverter charger?  I don't think the difference between those two numbers is that great...

Of course whether the general public would be trusted with responsibility for equipment capable of delivering 15kW at 800V is another point to consider for future wiring regulations.  Society already permits it in the car so why not on a wall?

DShutt said:

Domestically, if you could charge your car twice as fast, didn't have to pay for a £500 built in charger option and had the possibility of V2G operation, how much would you pay for a home DC charger?    How.much would it cost to make a 15kW bi-directional inverter charger?  I don't think the difference between those two numbers is that great...

15kW at 230V single phase is 65A. So that's my entire house supply devoted to charging the car. I can't imagine a bit of kit that turns 230V AC into 400 or 800V DC at that sort of power is going to be cheap.

To what purpose? Every car on the market has an AC charger built in, that can handle powers as low as 2.3kW if that's all that is available. Most handle at least 11kW, and some 22kW on AC. Which is enough to charge the car overnight.

Why do you need a high power charger once you have arrived ? Surely the battery will last for more cycles  on slower charge rates while you sleep or enjoy your dinner - and as a bonus without digging up the pavement for a new supply - dont forget the street transformers and all the HV behind them are sized on about 2kW ADMD per house - so that high power charger would become quite expensive if more than about 10% of houses wanted one.
However a bidirectional car inverter that could say feed 3kW into the supply might be nice - that could support the house baseload plus an option to sell some to grid at peak times. 
We need fast chargers at motorway services as we need petrol pumps that deliver at multi MW rates, I suspect for many that at home the electrical equivalent of a drinking fountain rate of petrol would be just fine.
Mike.

Why do you need a high power charger once you have arrived ? Surely the battery will last for more cycles  on slower charge rates while you sleep or enjoy your dinner - and as a bonus without digging up the pavement for a new supply - dont forget the street transformers and all the HV behind them are sized on about 2kW ADMD per house - so that high power charger would become quite expensive if more than about 10% of houses wanted one.
However a bidirectional car inverter that could say feed 3kW into the supply might be nice - that could support the house baseload plus an option to sell some to grid at peak times. 
We need fast chargers at motorway services as we need petrol pumps that deliver at multi MW rates, I suspect for many that at home the electrical equivalent of a drinking fountain rate of petrol would be just fine.
Mike.

mapj1 said:

Why do you need a high power charger once you have arrived ?

To minimize the opportunity for a vixen to chew through it?

Our fairly new neighbours are making do with a granny lead, but the vixen has already gnawed some of the sheath away. She has also found her way to their bedroom!