Kauai’s electrical grid surges affect the life span of our computers, appliances, and other electronic equipment. Power surges can also completely roast the internal electronic parts during a storm or utility fault.

A whole house surge protector installed by a licensed electrician will greatly decrease the risk of power surge destruction.

Blue Sky Electric offers a quality whole panel surge protector for your home or business (parts and labor)

Guarding against surges requires a two-pronged approach: a whole-house suppressor to tame the big, dangerous power spikes and an individual circuit (or “plug-in”) surge suppressor for vulnerable appliances and electronic devices. Both types essentially act like pressure-relief valves. Normally they just sit there, allowing electric current to flow through them. But with higher-than-normal voltage, the devices instantly divert excess voltage to the ground wire. (The best ones react in less than a nanosecond.) As soon as voltage levels return to normal, the flow of electricity is restored, unless the surge was big enough to melt the fuse built into some units.

Typically, whole-house suppressors are hard-wired to the service panel, a process that takes a licensed electrician about two hours. Whole-house systems should be rated to stop a 40,000-amp surge, at minimum. Features to look for include thermal fuses, and lights or alarms that indicate when a device has taken a hit. Protection for an average house with 200-amp service will run about $500 — including a couple of hours of an electrician’s labor. Separate but smaller whole-house units are recommended for the phone and cable lines. These protect fax and answering machines, televisions, and modems.

By themselves, whole-house suppressors can’t stop surges completely; up to 15 percent of excess voltage may leak by. That’s where “plug-in” surge protectors come in. These buffers between individual appliances and wall outlets come in a bewildering array of options and prices. They range from $70 units not much bigger than a computer mouse to $350 units the size of a pizza box that guard all the components in a home theater. But most plug-in models fall into three basic categories: the familiar multi-outlet power strip; the multitasking surge station that can handle phone and cable jacks as well as power cords; and the UPS (uninterruptible power supply), which completely cleanses electric power of random fluctuations and provides a short-term battery backup in case the power dips or goes out entirely. Expect to pay between $20 and $70 for a quality power strip or surge station, and from $100 to $250 for a UPS.

Have you decided to take the plunge—pun intended, and buy a hot tub? Coming home after a long day and climbing into a hot tub can be extremely satisfying. The hot water bubbling and washing over sore muscles can soothe all those aches and pains that tend to build up over the day.

Your first step is to head to the specialty store that sells the hot tubs. Pick the tub that is the right size for your family’s needs. There are a lot of choices and this may be a process that takes you several weeks. Once you have chosen the perfect tub, you need to decide exactly where it is it will go in your yard. Remember to consider the power needed to operate the tub when you are thinking of placement. Then, you will need to call your electrician. Beverly Hills homeowners can give The Electric Connection a call to discuss installation.

Because of the amount of electricity needed to power a hot tub, it requires a dedicated breaker. The luxury appliance will also need to be hard-wired into your home’s main power. This is a big job that requires the experience and knowledge of a certified electrician. In most cases, county and city codes require a licensed electrician completes the hook up.

If your home is older, you may need to have an electric panel upgrade to accommodate the new hot tub. If you are unsure of what you have, call your electrician. Beverly Hills homeowners will need to ensure their home has the additional power needed to power the hot tub. This is typically not something the average person would be able to tell by simply looking at the electric panel.

Give The Electric Connection a call and we will be happy to inspect your electrical panel and complete the hot tub installation for you.

It used to be that the moon and the stars were the brightest bulbs in the sky. But as anyone who’s flown across a city at night knows, these days, there are an awful lot of outdoor lights shining up from the ground.

Many people assume that an orange nighttime sky is just ugly, not harmful. But recently scientific studies have suggested that light pollution is more than an annoyance; it’s destroying wildlife, damaging human health and costing us a lot of extra money.

That’s why a growing number of cities and towns across the United States are drafting ordinances to try to bring the night sky back. They’re requiring that all new outdoor lighting fixtures that are installed – both commercial and residential – only shine light down onto the place that needs to be lit, not up into the atmosphere.

Known as the Dark Sky movement, these ordinances vary from town to town, but often the requirements are similar. No outdoor lighting fixtures can shine any light above a horizontal line. Instead, everything must shine down.

“We’re not saying you can’t have that aesthetic value, you just light it from the top down,” explains Johanna Duffek, Sections Coordinator with the International Dark Sky Association, a Tucson, AZ-based non-profit group that’s at the forefront of the movement.

Although the original purpose of The International Dark Sky Association was to keep the night sky pristine for astronomers, today the Dark Sky movement is gaining ground because more consumers are interested in reducing their energy usage, and when you’re not wasting light that’s going up into the sky, you can use a lower wattage bulb to achieve the same level of exterior lighting.

For example, if a homeowner used an outdoor sconce that had openings on the top and the bottom, he’d have to use a 100-watt bulb. But if he switches to a Dark Sky fixture that only allows light to shine from the bottom of the fixture, the homeowner could use a 40-watt bulb.

“It’s a more efficient use of light,” explains Tom Patterson, Director of Product Development at Hinkley Lighting, which already offers some Dark Sky light fixtures. “You can use a third of the wattage or half of the wattage and get the same amount of lumens.”

Patterson says consumer awareness of the Dark Sky movement is still very low, but he said awareness has been growing among local government leaders, and that is forcing the manufacturers to come out with more and more Dark Sky-friendly outdoor fixtures.

“Now in Arizona, in all the new construction, you’re going to have to meet the dark sky qualifications,” Patterson says. “It’s catching a little bit more momentum.” Hinkley, for example, advertises that it can make about 25 percent of its outdoor lighting fixtures Dark Sky compliant. Retailers are charged about $15 to $20 to change a regular fixture to a Dark Sky fixture.

Currently, there is no official government standard for a Dark Sky fixture, but the International Dark Sky Association has been in talks with the Department of Energy to incorporate the Dark Sky philosophy into the Energy Star program.

The International Dark Sky Association also independently evaluates fixtures from manufacturers and awards a seal of approval to all of those that meet its requirements.

So far, Duffek says the International Dark Sky Association has awarded Fixture Seals of Approval to 75 different lighting manufacturers, and while many of those have been commercial applications, Duffek says the organization is hoping to increase participation among residential lighting manufacturers.

Hubbardton Forge, for example, makes a sconce that has received the Dark Sky Fixture Seal of Approval that features a slate-colored ceramic shield around the light bulb that forces the light down. And the Minka Group has several outdoor lights with metal crowns that block the upward light.

Both Patterson and Duffek say the biggest resistance to Dark Sky fixtures isn’t coming from manufacturers but from homeowners who are afraid that less exterior lighting around their house will make them less safe.

But Duffek said homeowners need to understand that blocking light from going into the sky doesn’t mean blocking all exterior lighting. Duffek says the Dark Sky movement suggests homeowners buy outdoor lights with movement sensors that will go on if someone enters your yard, which can help alert you to danger and keep your energy usage down at the same time.

“When you keep the lighting on all the time, all you’re doing is lighting for the bad guys,” Duffek says.

Duffek says the biggest challenge now is to educate the public about the benefits of reducing light pollution and encouraging manufacturers to continue to design compliant fixtures.

“We always try to present it as a win, win, win solution,” she says.

An electrical circuit works as a loop where electricity flows from a source and then returns to that point again after powering the device connected to it. The power flow interrupts or stops if the path is broken. There are also receptacles, fixtures, or switches joined to the course through different types of electrical wiring.

Every electrical circuit has a specific breaker or fuse that controls it. Inside the main electrical panel of your house, you will find reference numbers to identify which breaker or fuse is assigned to which circuit. Mapping of them is a standard electrical safety procedure.

power company supplies electricity to your home through the transmission and distribution lines. The energy enters the service panel, also known as the fuse or breaker box, after passing through a meter. Then, the box has three wires (hot, neutral, and ground featuring insulation of different colors) that do the jobs of transmitting the power to an external outlet, returning to the source, and providing the ground.

The wires of your home are generally installed in three ways:

It’s a wiring system where a single electrical circuit supplies power for several devices. There are various housing boxes from where both hot and neutral wires emerge and run along the route. They branch off to single receptacle and fixture.

It’s the most common of all the systems seen in residential settings.

Switch Wiring

Installed on hot wires, such a system has switches that either transmit or break the current flow to various devices or lighting fixtures. A switch changes its position to allow or interrupt the flow of electricity to electrical machines and instruments.

The system routes the hot wire through various fixtures before joining to the neutral one, which then carries the power to the source. It’s the least used and most inconvenient of all the types because it connects the devices, i.e., lights in a series. So, the circuit breaks off when just one light is burnt out.

Parallel wiring is the best option for household settings because it does not break even when one of the connected fixtures goes kaput. Nevertheless, remember not to run too many electronics from one source because each circuit can carry only a maximum electrical flow.

These days, computers exist in our homes in one form or another. In most instances, these complex devices are expensive and if they get damaged in any way that can make you feel frustrated and getting them fixed can be an expensive proposition. Computers require electricity to function and even devices such as laptops, iPads and other tablets that operate on batteries have to be charged at one or the other time. Improper function and use can result in major electrical-related damage to your expensive equipment. Here are a few tips to maintain computer electrical safety in your home:

In one of our past blogs we have discussed in a detailed manner about the GFCI outlet, it helps protect your electrical devices like computers from power surges. In case of an electrical storm, or an electrical surge due to a problem in the electrical system, you can rest easy knowing that it won’t affect your devices.