In a typical home electrical panel installation the main ground wire is considered directly from ground rod driven into the ground to the?

Answer 1

If you mean what is the connection from the ground rod in the ground to where ? then the answer is through the earth (earth meaning the planet but "mud" will do) back to the generator (my employment) neutral point at the Power Station. Imagine a three bladed propeller( the three windings of the generator), the electrical output increases as you move along the blades (from the centre) to the blade tips (max output is at the blade tips, 3 off) the centre spinner of the propeller is the neutral point (zero watts). That point is connected/grounded to earth. There can not be electrical flow etc without a completed circuit so from the generator output then to the device then it must get back to the generator (to complete the circuit) and it does this via the neutral point, which is why we called the electrical leads in a 13 Amp plug for example Live, NEUTRAL, and Earth (Earth and Neutral are really electrically connected). There are certainly "cleaverer" (Electrical Engineers) people out there than me, so maybe they will add additional information. Hope this helps