The nationwide electrical grid is probably the most important feat of modern engineering — but actually dealing with that electricity through power cables, plugs, transformers, and sockets is the biggest bane of my life. Whether I’m plugging in a smartphone, managing the battery life on my laptop, connecting my breakout soundcard via USB, looking for a plug converter for an upcoming trip, or scrabbling around behind my PC trying to find the right orientation for a power lead, my life virtually revolves around electricity.

Wouldn’t it be cool if every power socket and plug was the same? Think about it: Your country already has universal wall sockets — why don’t gadgets? Imagine if you could carry around a single cable and plug in any device to the wall, in any country.

We are already beginning to see this with smartphones and tablets, which — except for Apple devices, of course — have standardized on USB. For now there are limits on how much power you can push over a USB cable, but later this year USB Power Delivery will allow for up to 100 watts. 100 watts is more than enough to power any high-tech gizmo, up to and including 24-inch LCD monitors.

In other words, in a year or two, almost everything on your desk and almost everything under your TV could replace its proprietary power connector with a Micro-USB socket. If a later revision of the USB Power Delivery spec ups the max wattage to 200 or 300 watts, your TV, computer, and video game consoles could all be connected via USB as well.

To complete this image, now imagine that every wall socket in your house is an A-type USB socket. Gone are the brutal, foot-destroying trident prongs of UK plugs. Gone are the wobbly, prone-to-falling-out, who-needs-an-earth?! US plugs. Every plug in the world would be replaced with an A-type USB connector. These sockets are already available from ThinkGeek and other electrical stores.

If that wasn’t enough, get this: These USB wall sockets could double up as smart sockets, too. At the moment, the USB socket in your iPad or Kindle charger is dumb; it’s simply a charging socket. You could integrate a USB host controller, though, effectively turning each wall socket into a USB micro controller. These smart sockets would allow every device could negotiate its power requirements, meaning transformer bricks could become a thing of the past.

USB and Ethernet networks can be formed over AC power, too. Right now, with the right hardware, you could form a network between a power socket in your bedroom and a power socket downstairs. Universal USB wall sockets would mean that your entire house is networked together — and, if you connect a modem, to the internet as well. Not only would universal power leads simplify our lives, then, but they’re also exactly what we need to finally get the green, energy-saving, highly-automated “smart home” concept from whiteboard to reality.

A universal, intelligent power socket would be awesome for cafes, airports, waiting rooms, and other commercial locations, too. Just this morning, Sony announced that it’s working on a power socket that can ascertain the user’s identity, and thus grant them “permission” to draw power. The idea is that you swipe an NFC-enabled smartphone across the socket, and then you get charged for the power that you use. Power obviously isn’t a huge expense, but you can see how similar technology might be used to govern bandwidth, or perhaps to create a VPN between a power socket in an airport and your computer back home.

A dreamy smile spreads across my face as I imagine life with universal power sockets and cables. Whenever I leave the house — irrespective of whether I’m heading to the office, a friend’s house, or a foreign country — all I would have to bring is a couple of USB cables. When fiddling with the back of my PC or monitor, I know exactly which way around the power cable goes. I would never have to worry about any of my devices running out of juice ever again.

With universal power connections you could even go one step further, too: You could have wall sockets with built-in power cables. Imagine: A wall socket with a retractable Micro-USB connector sticking out of it. Just pull it out, stick it into your laptop/smartphone/tablet, and off you go. Salivating yet? I am.