Power control - Definition and Overview

(Electric) Power Control deals with routing electric power, controlling its quality, and controlling the devices attached to a power line.

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A number of technologies have evolved for using the power wiring to turn devices attached to the power line on and off, monitoring attached devices, and similar activities. A collective term for one set of technologies is smart buildings. It should be mentioned that as of 2002 smart building technologies have been less than an overwhelming success. Problems include reliability, cost, questions about how great the need is, and the fact that many smart building tasks such as turning on a lamp at dusk can be performed equally well by simpler, cheaper, and often more reliable, mechanical or electro-mechanical devices. The best known smart building technologies are X10 and Cebus.

See also domotics, universal plug-and-play, distributed generation.