Ask an Expert about Electricity, Natural Gas,
& Energy Efficiency

Answer: Yes in fact, it can improve it! Your car radio has two antennas—one each for AM and FM. The AM antenna is actually longer, but it’s a copper wire wound around a short metal rod inside the radio receiver behind the dashboard, so you don’t normally see it. The one sticking out of your car is the FM antenna. On older vehicles, this sticks straight up, but because most FM radio waves are horizontal, having the antenna at a 45-degree angle improves FM reception. You’ll see that many newer model cars have the antennae permanently set at 45 degrees.

Answer: GUC is currently using some test models of smart meters. Smart meters use an internal antenna that is hooked up to a communications network to send electricity usage data to the utility. (An external antenna is sometimes needed for improving signals over longer distances and ensuring reliable data transmission. This antenna can be attached on or near the meter box.) This means meter readers don’t have to visit residences for data collection. However, meters may need to be examined occasionally for testing and maintenance. Smart meters can also record the alternative energy—such as energy from wind turbines and solar panels—that a residence might feed back into the distribution network.

Answer: Shoes hanging on a power line don’t get burned for the same reason that birds standing on a power line don’t get shocked: they don’t give electricity a path to the ground, so electricity stays in the line and does not go through them. But if the shoes were to touch a power line and a power pole at the same time, they would provide a path to the ground and would get blasted with electric current. It wouldn’t be pretty! By the way, if you ever see someone throwing shoes up onto a line, tell them to stop! The shoes can damage the power line, or someone trying to get the shoes down could be seriously shocked or even killed.

Answer: A natural gas flame burns hotter than a campfire. In general, cooler flames appear yellow, orange, or red, while hotter flames look blue or white. (Flecks of orange in your gas flames are OK, but if the flame is yellow, large, and flickering, the appliance may need a safety adjustment by a qualified repair person.)

Answer: Organic waste emits methane as it decomposes—or rots—in a landfill. Landfills can collect and treat the methane, and then sell it as a commercial fuel; or they can burn it to generate steam and electricity. Today, there are almost 400 gas energy landfill projects operating in the United States.

Answer: Yes! An electric eel uses chemicals in its body to manufacture electricity. A large electric eel can produce a charge of up to 650 volts, which is more than five times the shocking power of a household outlet.

Answer: The ancient Chinese were the first to discover underground deposits of natural gas. In 600 BC, Confucius wrote of wells 100 feet deep yielding water and natural gas along the Tibetan border. The Chinese piped the gas to where it was needed through long, hollow bamboo stalks.

Answer: The greenhouse effect is created because certain gases sent into our atmosphere, such as carbon dioxide, allow radiation from the sun to pass through the earth’s atmosphere, but prevent a portion of the infrared radiation from the earth’s surface and lower atmosphere from escaping into outer space. This process occurs naturally; without it our planet’s temperatures would be about 60 degrees cooler! Life as we know it simply would not exist without the natural greenhouse effect. However, many scientists believe global warming is happening because the greenhouse effect has become intensified by human activities: These activities (primarily the burning of fossil fuels) add more carbon dioxide and other gases to the atmosphere and accelerate the earth’s natural warming process.

Answer: Replacing one incandescent light bulb with an energy-saving compact fluorescent bulb prevents about 1,000 pounds of carbon dioxide from being emitted to the atmosphere from power plants, and saves about $67 dollars in energy costs over the bulb's lifetime.