I have always wondered how the world, with the widespread trade that exists between countries, hasn't gotten together and made at least the first steps towards real standards. I guess that the Metric ISO standard is a good beginning, but as anyone in a metric country knows, even the metric system seems to have different standards in each of the countries which use it as a basis for measurements. But all the countries in the world but one use at least some form of the same system. The last country in the entire world which is not using the metric system in daily life is the US. (The Burmese were the last Imperial country to convert). Not that the US system is actually Imperial, as it never followed the British standards, but created special ounces, gallons, machine screw threads and other bits. Why does the US have to continue to force every manufacturer to make two different packages, one to the US measurement and the other to the metric one? Waste.

Measurements are not the only way that the worlds standards are out of sync. Why are there still two right-of-way protocols? Originally all traffic went to the left, with the exception of ships at sea, which always passed on the right. After the revolutions in France and the American colonies, the new republicans felt that they didn't want to follow the aristocratic Knights on the left side of the road, and so decided to use the rules of the road for ships, and began driving on the right side. There is little to recommend either one over the other, but a single standard should be decided on to be used everywhere, to make it safer for travellers and to reduce the redundant manufacturing of LHD and RHD vehicles. One type could be sold and driven everywhere. More waste.

Money changers are the biggest cause of financial waste which could be eliminated by creating a common monetary unit to be used by everyone, preferably one based on gold, which is not subject to the wholesale print-up by governments in need of money. The Europeans are to be supported in their attempts to establish the Euro, although it is only a first step. I know that there are people that fear a single currency, and that is why it needs to be the gold standard. Paying a fee to change your money from one currency to another is even more waste.

Power is not quite as obvious as the other ones, but perhaps is more important to the planet. The system of three-phase alternating current electrical generation and distribution was invented by a nineteenth century creative genius named Nicola Tesla. Tesla made many careful calculations and measurements before settling on 60 Hz as the best frequency for AC power generating. He preferred 240 volts, which put him at odds with Thomas Edison, whose DC systems were 110 volts. Perhaps Edison had a useful point in the safety factor of the lower voltage, but DC couldn't provide the power to a distance that AC could.

The first generating facility built in Europe hit a snag in the planning stage. Although the engineers accepted the 200 volt level (actually they chose 220 volts), they wouldn't go for the 60 Hz frequency, because the number 60 didn't fit the metric standard unit sequence (1,2,5), and insisted on 50 Hz. Westinghouse engineers had always preferred 133 Hz, and had been reluctant to go with 60, in spite of the arguments of Tesla, so they didn't push the point with the Europeans. Big mistake, the most waste here, and of precious energy.

Not only is 50 Hz 20% less effective in generation, it is 10-15% less efficient in transmission, it requires up to 30% larger windings and magnetic core materials in transformer construction. Electric motors are much less efficient at the lower frequency, and must also be made more robust to handle the electrical losses and extra heat generated. Funny thing is, I don't think that there has ever been a 50 Hz country who changed the speed of its generators. I doubt it would be that difficult, as the increase in speed is only 20%, and the 50 Hz machines would be actually overbuilt for the higher frequency. Shaft torque would be the same. Internal combustion engines would be more efficient at the higher speed. The only technical difficulty would be to readjust the excitation of the alternators. This would give a lot more energy from the installed base, 20+% without building more plants. Very little is dependent on power line frequency any more.

One of the last things which need standardization is the TV systems of the world, which in the beginning were made to be synchronized to the frequency of the electrical power systems. In those days it would have been too expensive to have used a crystal clock in a consumer TV product. All of todays TVs use crystals and are completely independent of the line frequency. So the Europeans had a system with 625 lines and 25 frames/second, whereas the US used 525 lines and 30 frames/second. The line sweep rates are very similar, 15,650 at the 25 frame rate and 15,750 at the 30 frame rate. Movies use a 24 frames/second rate, so there is no relationship between the three different visual standards! This is the black-and-white standard we are talking about.

The colour standards are even more confusing, since the first system was set up in the US, and was the result of a choice between two competing ideas, one by CBS and the other by RCA. The one selected (RCA's) was thereafter termed NTSC, after the body which chose it, the National Television Standards Committee. (In other countries the engineers say it stands for "Never Twice the Same Colour"). A few years later researchers in Europe developed a superior technique for encoding the colour, called PAL, for Phase Alteration by Line. Pal did not have the problems of the NTSC system in determining what the colour was, but unfortunately it required a delay line to store the information which was coded on alternate lines. A subsequent refinement developed in France was termed SECAM for Sequence with Memory (in French). This system also used a delay line. The two later systems were adopted by the 50 Hz countries, naturally the SECAM was used in France, and the remainder of Europe used PAL. Today there is a 60 Hz country with the superior colour system, called PAL-M, and it is Brazil. Worse, there are several variants of each of these systems in use. Talk about waste!

The world doesn't need to be wasting resources on this sort of stuff. I believe it is time to establish standards for these thing which will be adapted by everyone. Let's help make life simpler, and try to make our limited resources go further.

Back to the top