[GTALUG] Dirty Power and Wi Fi Far field effect

[James Knott]

On 03/14/2015 07:32 PM, Lennart Sorensen wrote:
> Well I suppose that with the main distribution being 3 phase power,
> but only running 2 phase power in residential areas (which I believe
> is generated by transformers from just 1 of the 3 phases in the main
> distribution, called I believe split phase, using a centre tap to ground
> to give the 2 phases, 180 degrees apart), does result in a potentially
> quite unbalanced grid, where the 3 phases could get rather out of balance.
> I have no idea if this really results in a big load imballance problem
> in general, or not.

Yes, residential distribution is just a single phase, center tapped. 
While only one phase is used in an area, other phases will be used
elsewhere with the loads approximately balanced.  In fact, in some
areas, 3 phase is run at high voltage, with the distribution
transformers, along the line, connected across different phases   The
centre tap results in the phases being 180° apart at the customer.  The
advantage of this is the neutral current will be the difference of that
in the two "hot" lines.