Scalable Innovation

234 Scalable Innovation

CONSIDERING THE CONTROL FUNCTIONALITY

In Edison’s DC system, control over current ow could be done mostly

statically, like with the parallel circuit design we discussed earlier. While it

worked great for relatively small installations, DC power could not be easily

switched up or down depending on the change in power demand. With the

improvements in the transformer and switching technology, the AC advan-

tage in the Control area proved to be very important during the later stages

of the electric grid expansion. Eventually, when it was needed, large regions

of the country were able to exchange electric energy, providing for a greater

reliability of the energy grid as a whole. To mark this advantage, we put “+”

for the A ...