Subs
This component changes voltage levels to step power up or down.
Transformer
The maximum voltage currently used in the US
What is 765kV?
The final voltage delivered to homes in the U.S.
What is 120/240V?
This fossil fuel is the most common energy source for U.S. electricity.
What is Natural Gas?
What term is used to describe a complete and sudden loss of electrical power in an area?
What is a blackout?
These rigid conductors connect substation components and carry large current loads.
What are bus bars?
This type of transmission line tower is used when the line changes direction or terminates, and it must withstand unbalanced mechanical forces.
What is a dead-end tower (or strain tower)?
Identify the voltage range typically used for medium-voltage distribution feeders in North American systems.
What is 4kV to 35kV?
The standard frequency for AC electricity in North America.
What is 60Hz?
How many major power interconnections divide the electrical grid in the continental U.S.?
What are three? (Eastern, Western, and ERCOT/Texas)
What is a substation without a transformer typically called?
What is a Switchyard?
Which system monitors and controls grid operations remotely, providing real-time data on power flow and equipment status?
What are SCADA systems?
This type of distribution system improves reliability in urban areas but is more expensive and complex to operate than a radial design.
What is a looped or closed-loop distribution system?
Which component adjusts the voltage levels on a feeder line in response to load changes to improve on voltage regulation.
Which 2003 event impacted the U.S. and Canada, disrupting power for over 50 million people?
What is the Northeast Blackout of 2003?
This type of relay coordination minimizes outage areas by ensuring devices operate in time sequence during faults.
What is time-current coordination?
The term for the audible noise you hear when standing next to a high voltage transmission line.
What is Corona?
This device briefly interrupts faults to allow automatic restoration and must coordinate with fuses to avoid unnecessary outages.
What is a recloser?
This type of power supports voltage levels across transmission systems and is regulated using devices like capacitors and STATCOMs.
What is reactive power?
Who built the first centralized electric power station in the United States, launching the commercial electricity era?
Who is Thomas Edison (Pearl Street Station)?
These two substation configurations differ in breaker sharing and fault isolation; one allows complete circuit switching without outages, the other offers greater reliability by using shared breakers.
What are ring bus and breaker-and-a-half configurations?
This specialized conductor type uses a high-strength composite core to reduce sag and increase ampacity.
What is ACCC (Aluminum Conductor Composite Core)?
This method of coordinating protection devices ensures that faults are isolated as close to the fault as possible, using time-current curves for fuses, reclosers, and relays across the distribution feeder.
What is protective device coordination?
This voltage rise phenomenon occurs at the receiving end of lightly loaded long lines and is mitigated with shunt reactors or VAR control.
What is the Ferranti effect?
This proposed global project aims to link continents via HVDC?
What is the Global Energy Interconnection (GEI)?