Post #1883135
2023-06-04 10:03 UTC
Disclaimer: While I have been writing code in this domain for a decade, I am not an electrical engineer and mostly only learned what I needed on the job. Electrical engineering is complicated, people spend years studying it, and there is no way I could cram everything needed into this thread even if I knew it all—which I absolutely do not. So I have to oversimplify things.
Dear electrical engineers, reading this might physically hurt you. I am sorry.
Now let's get started!
Replies (1)
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@sbi@toot.berlin 2023-06-04 10:04
Traditionally, electrical power is provided by big rotating masses. Steam, oil, diesel, or gas generators turn coils in magnetic fields, which creates an AC current in the coils. Their turning speed determines the grid's frequency. If too much energy is drawn from them, they slow down, if it is too little, they speed up. But machines have used centrifugal governors to regulate their speed at least since Watt invented his steam engine, so controlling rotation speed is a solved problem: