Grounding Electrical Panel

This is a brief walk through of a simple grounding and bonding system and what happens with the flow of current in normal operation and in a ground fault c.

Grounding electrical panel.

By shunting excess line voltage back to the panel s neutral pole the ground current forces the circuit breaker to trip. Grounding a main panel the ground bar is bonded internally when an external bond to earth is installed as described at the link for electrical grounding below. The tripped breaker shuts off the circuit s current preventing a potentially dangerous situation. The grounding wire that runs from your electrical panel to grounding electrode helps even out voltage increases that often occur because of lightning and other causes.

The wires that bond your metal piping are preventative and they only become important in the unlikely event that an electrical conductor energizes the pipe. Grounding and bonding happen simultaneously during the installation of an electrical system and branch circuits. Two problems make the safety of these approaches questionable. Because the panel must be connected to the.

The grounding pathway is generally formed by a system of bare copper wires that connect to every device and every metal electrical box in your home. The connection is often unreliable. In standard sheathed nm cable this bare copper wire is included along with the insulated conducting wires inside the cable. Which scenario is recommended.

Alternatively you might consider connecting the ground terminal to a water pipe by means of an exposed ground wire. If your electrical cables have metal sheathing that runs all the way to the panel the sheathing can serve as a ground path. Distance from the electrical panel nec article 250 does not specify a minimum or maximum distance between the main electrical panel and the ground rod.