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But was it in the beginning? I’m not old enough to remember what it was like when it started but clearly there was a lot of propaganda. The unpopularity seemed to manifest over time, as there was no goal and people dying over something most americans didn’t care about.

Or at least that’s my impression.

As a European those power draws listed sound absolutely absurd to me

Let me clarify - those are standard sized circuits, not actual draw. However the service has to be sized to handle it, and over-provisioning to account for it.a customer might install a stove that draws the full load and might use all the burners at once, and you have to account for typical usage patterns.

For sure it’s a well earned stereotype that Americans use more electricity than many other places. We tend to have bigger houses, more and bigger appliances. We not only don’t have that base charge per size of service but too some extent are charged less to use more: essentially we subsidize people electric resistive heat, who can pay a lower usage rate. We also don’t usually have time of use metering, although some do: my rate is the same whether I charge my car at night or at peak time. And of course our current leadership is intent on rolling back the efficiency standards we have.

Taking your heat pump dryer example, those are finally available here but tend to cost a lot more than a traditional dryer: savings on efficiency will never make back the extra purchase cost More importantly they’ve only been available in small sizes, not typical for houses, especially with families

That may be the entire difference, we don’t have that base cost. Our monthly bill is mainly the actual useage, itemized into generating cost, transfer cost, fees and taxes. There is usually an administrative fee but that’s fixed cost.

1. Sometimes breakers don’t trip, so there’s a small risk of fire
2. Restarting the whole house may have large initial loads as everything starts at once: more chance of it happening again or potentially damaging some appliances
3. Risk of heat damage to wiring with repeated trips, risk of broken connections from more frequent expansion from heat/cool cycles
4. Inconvenience, especially in the old days when you’d have to go through to set clocks. If while asleep you might not be awoken in time. If you weren’t home, maybe food gone bad
5. Occasional home health appliances are critical to keep going

Realistically it comes down to how conservative you are with over-provisioning. You might also expect it to handle the load for 50 years of growing usage. In the US we have the expectation of rarely to never tripping the main and when that happens it’s more likely an electrician call

There’s a standard

• https://ask-the-electrician.com/residential-electrical-load-calculation.html

Then you’d round up to the nearest service level. Realistically, I believe most recent-ish houses are 200a service now with larger ones or hot climates tending to 300a+

In my experience people get by with a 3x25A (17 kW available, matches approximately a 70A service in the US)

Wow, how do you do that?

Of course over-provisioning is a thing but that’s crazy. Maybe you have much smaller appliances or assume much lower usage, but 70a basically assumes 2 major appliances at a time, using close to max load, and with nothing else turned on.

Typical 240v major appliances

• level 2 EV charger: 50a
• stove: 50a
• central ac: 40a
• dryer: 40a
• heat pump: 50a+
• water heater: 50a

Of course you won’t use them all at once and they won’t usually be drawing their full rated load but I would not want to deal with being limited to one at a time so I can also turn on the lights or use the microwave

That can theoretically draw 280a, before you even count things like lights and small appliances. If you added up all possible circuits, you may be hitting 1000a theoretical in a modern house. I’m comfortable that My 200a service will handle any combination I might use, but 70a definitely not

By contrast I once lived in an apartment with 60a service. It did not have most of these large appliances but I frequently tripped the main with combinations like stove + window ac + microwave + lights

My town outside of Boston, technically a city, has like three screenfuls of parking minimums listed to cover many situations. New apartment buildings in the center require 1.25 spots per unit, as part of othe statewide goal for transit oriented development

I’m rooting for the people on the left coast to get this. While I have no idea what the projects should have done differently, and it’s not my money, the case for this projects is still overwhelmingly positive. We need this at just about any price and I can only hope experience here makes future such projects easier

And human rights. Due process. Rule of law and respect the constitution. Less inflation. More progress on our environment. Rebuild some infrastructure. Invest in some technologies of the future rather than the past. Leadership that understands basic economics and actually the art of the deal

You should make bread ….. but only if you can control it. I’m another one of many who gained way too much weight. I got a bread machine over pandemic and made a loaf every Saturday night. The problem was I swear it was a full year before there was anything left to wrap and put away.

Then I got some blood tests back. And it was bread. All bread.

I believe dryer outlets are typically 30a@240v. That’s a nice step up than a standard outlet and simple math shows 4x the power of 15a@120v

If you have one in your garage, then you already have an outlet that can do faster charging than a standard outlet.

Just like you technically don’t need a 50a level 2 charger, you may not have to settle for a standard outlet. I bought a heavy duty extension cable with adapters for several different outlet types.

For me the smart charger was a key feature, and I never understood why that is never talked about. I have 200a service which was plenty for one fully powered charging service, but with the likelihood of electrification in upcoming years I was hesitant to have two. It was pretty clear I needed to prioritize smart charging so I’d have that possibility.

I can also configure it to only charge my allowed vehicles, should that ever become an issue

So far my family only has the one EV, so we only need the one charger. But I like that if we needed a second charger it could be on the same circuit and they could dynamically share the power to maximize charging