Electrification

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Electrification refers to the modification of a system so that it operates using electricity.

Electric grid

A more specific usage of the word refers to the act or process of building the necessary infrastructure to supply electric power to homes and businesses, especially in rural and isolated areas. It also applies to the changeover of a railway from self contained steam locomotives, or in modern times diesel-powered locomotives to electric locomotives. The infrastructure required for electrification includes power plants, an electric power transmission grid, substations and shorter distribution lines to the end user.

Countries

One of the largest electrification projects was the GOELRO plan, adopted in 1920 and fulfilled in 1931 in the USSR.

In the United States, widespread rural electrification began with the establishment of the Rural Electric Administration (REA) in 1935 and its associated local Rural Electric Cooperatives.

Electrification pioneers

• Sidney McMath
• Tennessee Valley Authority

Mobile electrification

Electrification of transportation (electromobility)^[1] is the use of hybrid electric and all-electric vehicles instead of all-petroleum vehicles (also called fossil-fuel vehicles, internal combustion engine vehicles or simply combustion vehicles).^[2]

Electrification, in a railway context, describes the process of converting a railway system from steam- or diesel-powered propulsion, to electric traction, and covers the modification of the infrastructure and the provision of suitable rolling stock.

Electrification of transport (electromobility) figures prominently in the Green Car Initiative, included in the European Economic Recovery Plan presented November 2008. DG TREN is supporting a large European "electromobility" project on electric vehicles and related infrastructure with a total budget of around € 50million as part of the Green Car Initiative.^[1]

Energy Resilience

Electricity is:

• the ‘stickiest’ form of energy: it stays in the continent where it is produced.
• multi-sourced. If one source suffers a shortage, we can produce electricity from another, incluiding renewable sources.

As a result, it gives the greatest degree of energy resilience and the energy system is going to electrification ^[3].

See also

Energy portal

Look up electrification in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• All energy from renewable sources
• Decarbonization
• European Economic Recovery Plan
• E-transport
• Pickens Plan
• Railway electrification system
• Reindustrialization
• Renewable electricity
• Rural electrification
• Steam
• War of Currents

References