Title: Electrical Safety Is First And Foremost In Terminology
Course: WGF 107 DEVELOPMENT > Section: Content

Title | Electrical Safety Is First And Foremost In Terminology
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Electricity

In the context of buildings, electricity is the flowing of electron-powered energy used to power machines and other devices. Traditional electricity is created in coal-fired plants. More sustainable, renewable electricity can be generated through solar panels, wind farms, and other means.

System safety and reliability engineering

System safety and reliability engineering is an engineering discipline. Continuous changes in technology, environmental regulation and public safety concerns make the analysis of complex safety-critical systems more and more demanding.

A common fallacy, for example among electrical engineers regarding structure power systems, is that safety issues can be readily deduced. In fact, safety issues have been discovered one by one, over more than a century in the case mentioned, in the work of many thousands of practitioners, and cannot be deduced by a single individual over a few decades. Knowledge of the literature, the standards and custom in a field is a critical part of safety engineering. A combination of theory and track record of practices is involved, and track record indicates some of the areas of theory that are relevant. (In the USA, persons with a state license in Professional Engineering in Electrical Engineering are expected to be competent in this regard, the foregoing notwithstanding, but most electrical engineers have no need of the license for their work.)”

Safety is often seen as one of a group of related disciplines: quality, reliability, availability, maintainability and safety. (Availability is sometimes not mentioned, on the principle that it is a simple function of reliability and maintainability.) These issues tend to determine the value of any work, and deficits in any of these areas are considered to result in a cost, beyond the cost of addressing the area in the first place; good management is then expected to minimize total cost.

For full understanding, electrical safety is broken down into three distinct topics of discussion: Perspectives and Responsibilities, Modes of Electrical Safety, and Electrical Safety Resources. Each topic is independent but all three rely on the availability and enforcement of the others for full implementation of safety measures. One without the others results in exposure to the hazardous or potentially hazardous effects of electrical energy and its impact on personnel and equipment.
Attributions | Image courtesy of National Renewable Energy Lab – U.S. Department of Energy Content courtesy of:                                                      Sustainable Facilities Tool – U.S. General Services Administration, and Wikipedia – The Free Internet Encyclopedia