[BC] AC Voltage Drop

[RichardBJohnson at comcast.net]

I am not surprised!

Periodically, Boston Edison kills off a few neighborhood dogs as their owners watch them mark metal items including water hydrants. Most new work under the streets is done now with plastic piping! The leakage from the old underground utility tunnels can even light up fire hydrants! There several power stations converting normal AC utility power to 600 volts DC for the subway and a few DC elevators remaining. You should see the inside of these, 12 kV lines spewing from the underground with no stress-cones, dangling overhead, suspended using plastic clothesline, going to an ancient monster transformer leaking smelly brown oil, through an "air switch," then to a 400 hp motor-generator, installed when Edison ran it! It is amazing that it just hums along. The space around all this is filled with junk, too good to throw away, but to old to have any immediate use.

With fire-code violations plainly visible, one would wonder how much money will be lost in the city when the subway is shut down when (not if) this generating station explodes into an enormous cloud of burning poly-chlorinated, bi-phenols!

Cheers,
Richard B. Johnson
Book: http://www.AbominableFirebug.com/

----- Original Message -----
From: "Ron Nott" <ron at nottltd.com>

You may be surprised to learn that power plants are exempt from the National 
Electric Code.