Naked Science Forum
General Science => General Science => Topic started by: paul.fr on 24/02/2009 12:26:53
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Do (overhead) high voltage powerlines 'leak' electricity / electrons?
1: If they do could I stand beneath them with a fluorescent light, and that light would glow?
2: If they do, do they 'leak' more when it is windy?
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Yes they do leak. But the losses are smaller than the resistive power losses that would be involved with low voltage power tramsmission.
1. Yes, a fluorescent tube will strike if held under a high voltage power line.
2. They leak more when it's damp but I don't think that wind will affect the leakage much.
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If you stand near to a high tension cable on a damp day you can hear it buzzing and crackling. This is an arc striking across the wet insulators. The high voltage ionises the water, allowing a current to flow, which produces the audible crackle.
On a wet and windy day more airborne damp can be deposited on the insulators, so the effect would probably be reinforced. Hence I would expect power generators to face great losses on wet days.
Chris
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Thanks graham and chris.
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The artist Richard Box http://www.richardbox.com/ (http://www.richardbox.com/) has used this effect for quite an intriguing "installation" called Shake Pole.
One of the interesting things about it was that touching the tubes altered how much light they produced and running your hand up and down changed where the light was too, as did touching the tube whilst jumping in the air.
Not to be recommnded for environmental and safety reasons but as a young man, me and a chum had an afternoon of throwing "laser javelins" at each other, having found a skip full of old tubes outside a factory close to some power lines. [:I]
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Do (overhead) high voltage powerlines 'leak' electricity / electrons?
1: If they do could I stand beneath them with a fluorescent light, and that light would glow?
2: If they do, do they 'leak' more when it is windy?
Electricity generated in power stations, it is raised up to a very high voltage. yes they leak but slightly power losses.