Episode guide
Electricity: The Copper Highway
Inside the walls of your home runs a quiet copper highway. This episode follows the gentle push that becomes lamplight, and explains why the switch always knows.
The science, gently
- Electricity moves as a push passed between electrons in a wire, like a whisper down a long line of friends.
- The push itself travels at nearly the speed of light, though each electron barely shuffles.
- The copper in your walls may once have been ore deep inside a mountain.
Wonder together
- What do you think the inside of a wire would sound like, if it made a sound?
- How many lamps do you think are glowing on your street right now?
- Where was your night-light's copper a thousand years ago?
Tonight's calm-down
When the light goes out tonight, imagine the highway in the walls going quiet lane by lane, house by house, until the whole street is one soft dark ribbon, resting.