ground currents question

[cvasiliu]

My neighbor has an electrical fault (or maybe a weak neutral), and he puts current into the water pipe (water pipe grounding).
When he shuts off his power (from the main breaker), the current goes low, to ~ 0.9A, or less. When he turns on his power, the reading on the pipe could go as high as 6A. It seems that about half of his return current goes in the ground rather than the service neutral.
An electrician came, and looked at the ground wires, ..., and said there is no problem, .. he doesn't know.

Is this considered a violation of the NEC code ? How can I "force" him to fix his problem, when he considers there is no problem, and EMF doesn't bother him ?
(I found the problem by the high EMF in my house)

Thank you very much !

Cristian Vasiliu

 

[don_resqcapt19]

Re: ground currents question

If you are on a common metallic underground water system, it is not unusual to find 20% of more of the grounded conductor current on the metal underground water piping.
Don

 

[charlie]

Re: ground currents question

You are doing the same thing to your neighbor.

The neutral is in parallel with the water pipe. The water pipe goes to your house and (assuming your service is grounded properly) back to your service equipment. The current goes from the neighbor's home, through the water pipe to your service and back to the transformer.

The neutral current is the maximum unbalanced current that is on the service. You can read the above description from your home to your neighbor's service equipment. The current is no big deal. The EMF is another discussion. If you are interested in that, I would suggest you search the site. Some of us do not believe they are a problem, others believe they are to be feared. Since there is no basis in fact yet for either argument, I see no reason to open that argument again.

 

[cvasiliu]

Re: ground currents question

I already decoupled my circuit (so I don't inject current into him ) with a section of nonconductive pipe (PVC) which solves half of the EMF. The rest is because of the soil conductivity and proximity to the EMF source.

I would have never discovered this if I wouldn't feel it on my own "skin". I had ZERO knowledge of EMF one year ago (I'm an telecom design eng) when I found I can't sleep well, my muscles get tight overnight instead of relaxing and a weird pain in my stomach and more...since I moved to this place few years ago.

Originally posted by charlie:
You are doing the same thing to your neighbor.

The neutral is in parallel with the water pipe. The water pipe goes to your house and (assuming your service is grounded properly) back to your service equipment. The current goes from the neighbor's home, through the water pipe to your service and back to the transformer.

The neutral current is the maximum unbalanced current that is on the service. You can read the above description from your home to your neighbor's service equipment. The current is no big deal. The EMF is another discussion. If you are interested in that, I would suggest you search the site. Some of us do not believe they are a problem, others believe they are to be feared. Since there is no basis in fact yet for either argument, I see no reason to open that argument again.

 

[physis]

Re: ground currents question

If I'm not mistaken the frequency that human tissue absorbs electromagnetic energy at best is about 1000 megacycles or a gigacycle. 900 megacycles is a popular frequency for telephones. That's only 10% out of phase. Do you work around this kind of equipment?