Every day, we turned on the switch and don’t often consider where this power comes from or how it functions inside our homes. Electricity is incredibly versatile and yet we often take it for granted. It’s also bizarre to think that we’ve only been using it for a little over a century!

Electricity can do some pretty impressive things. It can occur in one location, which is called static electricity, or it can move from one place to another in the form of electric current.

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Static electricity normally occurs when certain materials are rubbed against something else. The best example of this is when you rub a balloon against your clothes. This type of electricity also produces lightning. When clouds full of rain travel across the sky, the air they move through rubs against them.

Simply put, an electric current means the flow of an electric charge. For the circuit, the charge is usually created by electrons moving inside the cable. It is involved in powering electrical appliances that you use every day, from mobile phones and laptops dishwashers, lamps and vacuum cleaners.

You can find out how much electricity you use by looking at your energy bills and giving your energy provider regular meter readings. For any electrical work in your home, consider an Essex Electrician. SM Electrical are Essex Electricians.

Here are some remarkable facts about electricity:

1. Electricity moves at a speed of 6.696 million miles per hour.
2. Electricity has an important part to play in how your liver is working. The cells in the heart muscle are contracted by electricity travelling through the body. An electrocardiogram machine that can be found in hospitals will calculate the electricity passing through the heart of a patient, showing a blip in a line for each heartbeat.
3. What is the Volt? Unit electrical force, measuring the strength of the current potential.
4. A typical lightning bolt packs 100 million volts.
5. Tasers are commonly used by police around the world to put out a whopping 50,000 volts!

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6. A burst of static electricity can reach up to 3,000 volts.
7. The electric eel has been known to make strong shocks over 500 volts.
8. The world’s biggest energy source to make electricity comes from coal but how does this happen? It is first placed in a furnace filled with boiling water. The steam that is produced spins a turbine attached to a generator or transformer.
9. The biggest source to create electricity comes from fossil fuels, however, renewable choices can also produce large amounts of electricity, such as wind, solar and hydro power.
10. The first electric vehicle that actually operated was constructed in early 1891 by an inventor in the US called William Morrison.
11. Contrary to popular belief, it was not Benjamin Franklin who discovered electricity, but he did prove that lightning is a form of electricity.

Thanks to the invention of the lightning rod revolutionary in the 18th century, electricity is better understood than before.