Electricity Today T&D Magazine

Taking care of your grounds and jumpers

A lineman’s ground and jumper cables look and feel like they’re built to last forever, but looks can be deceiving. They get tossed in the truck, dropped in the mud, left hanging in the rain, and generally overlooked. With everyday use, we start to take them for granted. And slowly the wear and tear adds up, compromising their mechanical and electrical reliability. That’s why the care, maintenance, and regular testing of your grounds and jumpers are so important.

Take your personal protective grounding personally

Grounds
Grounds are essential cables that contribute to your...

How Ontario regulation can improve electrical safety

BY BILL KHASHFE, London Hydro

According to an Ontario Electrical Safety Report, 35 percent of the province’s electrical-related fatalities in the past 10 years were attributed to power-line contact. Equipment specifications and electric utility construction plans within Ontario’s power industry, only a few decades ago, lacked regulation. Each utility developed its own policies.

Currently, the global economy has created a marketplace in which equipment is manufactured to various standards and, occasionally, with no standards at all. As a result, governments have started to step in to regulate the safety of equipment used...