Comments by "ke6gwf - Ben Blackburn" (@ke6gwf) on "A Complete Beginner's Guide to Electric Vehicles" video.

@ArniVidar since the average US 120 volt outlet is on a 20 amp circuit, that's exactly the same amount of power available as a 220 volt 10 amp circuit. In the US when you go to a 220 volt outlet, you are generally at least doubling the power available, and generally a 220 volt outlet will be 30 or 50 Amps at 220 volts, which is why in the US a 220 volt powered charger is considered to be much faster, not because the voltage is higher, but because the standard 220 volt circuits are designed for heavy loads like stoves and dryers, or chargers.
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That's the thing, good EVs generally require very little maintenance or repair compared to a gas car, because they have so many fewer parts.
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@ArniVidar I said that most outlets in the US (in newer houses anyway) are on 20 amp CIRCUITS. In other words on a 20 amp breaker with minimum 12 gauge wire to the outlet. The wall outlets themselves are generally 15 amp style outlets, but you can upgrade the outlet itself to a 15/20 amp combo outlet and still be legal, since the circuit is a 20 amp circuit. We can't even use 14 gauge romex over here anymore, 12 is the minimum. It is true that 1500 watts is the most common maximum current for small household appliances, but it's easy to find 1800 watt heaters (which you can use on a 15 amp outlet if that's the only load). They usually go with 1500 watts, because that's generally plenty of power, and because it's common for outlets to have other loads on them, and if you pushed right to the maximum, you would have more tripped breakers and issues. Also, a lot of our older houses still have 14 gauge wire and 15 amp circuits, and you don't want to load them with the maximum on older installations. But generally on a newer house you can get 20 amps from the wall outlet LEGALLY, by only swapping the outlet itself out and not putting anything else on that circuit. New single family residential homes in the US, at least in many states, are required to have a Minimum of a 200 amp service and main breaker. Older homes generally have at least a 100 amp service and breaker, with the oldest tiny houses with the original actual fuse box still installed might be 60 amp, or really old ones down to 40 amp fuses. A standard electric dryer or stove for us runs on a 30 amp circuit and outlet, while a big electric stove and oven may have a 50 amp outlet. 50 amp outlets are also often used to plug in a "caravan" or rv. So most laundry rooms or garages in the US will have a large 30 amp 110/220 volt outlet to run a dryer as standard equipment, unless it's designed to only use a gas dryer. I suspect that the difference is that we label things at 110, and you label them at 220, so they would be 15 amp and 25 amp circuits to you at 220 volts. I believe that you only have a single wire that goes through your main breaker for instance, so a 50 amp main breaker for you is the same amount of watts as a 100 amp 2 pole breaker for us, since we use split phase with each leg of 110 getting its own breaker, though the handles are tied together so they trip together.
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This is a common mistake, but in reality the energy loss through heat on lower voltages is compensated for by increasing the wire size. If you leave the wire size the same, then yes, for the same total amount of energy transferred, increasing the voltage lowers the current, and thus lowers the losses, but no one keeps the wires the same size! You figure out the wire size based on the voltage and wattage you will be flowing, to get an acceptable level of loss. It's like how you use larger extension cords the longer it is, or the higher the load.
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