Milestone-Proposal talk:Long distance transmission of electrical power using three-phase alternating current, 1891-1912

Advocates’ Checklist

1. Is proposal for an achievement rather than for a person? If the citation includes a person's name, have the proposers provided the required justification for inclusion of the person's name?
2. Was proposed achievement a significant advance rather than an incremental improvement to an existing technology?
3. Were there prior or contemporary achievements of a similar nature?
4. Has the achievement truly led to a functioning, useful, or marketable technology?
5. Is proposal adequately supported by significant references (minimum of five) such as patents, contemporary newspaper articles, journal articles, or citations to pages in scholarly books? At least one of the references from a peer-reviewed scholarly book or journal article. The full text of the material, not just the references, shall be present. If the supporting texts are copyright-encumbered and cannot be posted on the ETHW for intellectual property reasons, the proposers shall email a copy to the History Center so that it can be forwarded to the advocate. If the advocate does not consider the supporting references sufficient, the advocate may ask the proposer(s) for additional ones.
6. Are the scholarly references sufficiently recent?
7. Is proposed citation readable and understandable by the general public?
8. Does the proposed plaque site fulfill the requirements?
9. Is the proposal quality comparable to that of IEEE publications?
10. Scientific and technical units correct? (e.g. km, mm, hertz, etc.) Are acronyms correct and properly upperercased or lowercased?
11. Date formats correct as specified in Section 6 of Milestones Program Guidelines? https://ieeemilestones.ethw.org/Helpful_Hints_on_Citations,_Plaque_Locations

Reviewers’ Checklist

1. Is suggested wording of the Plaque Citation accurate?
2. Is evidence presented in the proposal of sufficient substance and accuracy to support the Plaque Citation?
3. Does proposed milestone represent a significant technical achievement?
4. Were there similar or competing achievements? If so, have the proposers adequately described these and their relationship to the achievement being proposed?

Submission and Approval Log

Submitted date: 16 November 2022
History Committee approval date: 30 April 2024
Board of Directors approval date: 24 June 2024

Original Citation Title and Text -- Administrator4 (talk) 20:55, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Long distance transmission of electrical power using three-phase alternating current, 1889-1912

In 1891 (till 1912), Michał Doliwo-Dobrowolski working at AEG in Berlin, Germany, carried out the world’s first long distance (175 km), high voltage (15 kV), highly efficient (75 %) electrical energy transmission of 300 HP, using the three-phase alternating current (he named “Drehstrom” i.e. “turning-current”) and the by him invented: generator (1890), squirrel cage motor (1889) and triangle or star windings transformer (1889). Already in 1896, they were adapted in Zielona Góra, Poland, then globally guided modern electrical engineering.

Advocate responce -- Pichkalov (talk) 08:43, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

Dear Proposers,

Long distance transmission of electrical power using three-phase alternating current from Lauffen to Frankfurt in 1891 - this not only showed the high efficiency of power transmission by three-phase systems, but also inspired many companies and countries to adopt this transmission method, and leading us to the current three-phase power system around the world. Yes, this is a Milestone for sure.

However, there are some specifics in the application itself that require editing and clarification:
- 1 - The title and citation don't match. The title concentrates on the particular technical achievement, but the citation concentrates on the personality of Michał Doliwo-Dobrowolski. You need to focus on the mentioned achievement from the Frankurt exhibition, not on all of Michał Doliwo-Dobrowolski's inventions.

Milestone must be focused on technical achievement not a person. Mention of names in citation is possible as an exception: b. The second case is when the proposal includes detailed, clearly stated, and incontrovertible evidence, particularly historical evidence and documentation, that one or more persons were central to the achievement and deserve to be singled out beyond others, and that the list is comprehensive and does not omit anyone who should be explicitly credited on the plaque. The procedure for including names in a citation will require several approvals by Milestone Subcommittee and History Committee.

- 2 - The specified 1891-1912 time interval is questionable. 1912 is indicated in the citation as the year Michał Doliwo-Dobrowolski ended his employment with the AEG. This is a not good use in terms of the chosen Title and the specificity of Milestone. In same time in application text mentioned "However, the three-phase power plant in Lauffen and an 11 km long initial section of the Doliwo-Dobrowolski’s line were used to supply electricity to Heilbronn and worked until 1912." This is a much more reasonable basis for specifying the 1912. But this must be appropriately reflected in the citation. Or the interval should be shortened.

- 3 - I found that old paper from 1991: https://web.archive.org/web/20120205124103/http://ieee.cincinnati.fuse.net/reiman/05_2001.html
"The Lauffen-Frankfurt project was essentially a joint venture of a German electrical company, Allgemeine Elektrizitats Gesellschaft (AEG) and a Swiss company, Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon. Michael Dolivo-Dobrowolsky of AEG designed a polyphase motor that drove a pump supplying an artificial waterfall at the Frankfurt exhibition. An Oerlikon engineer, C. E. L. Brown, designed an innovative polyphase generator which was driven by a water turbine on the Neckar River in Lauffen. He also designed an oil-insulated transformer for the project. A portion of the power brought from Lauffen was used for an illuminated sign with 1000 incandescent lamps"
As well as this paper: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=8944322
"The Lauffen–Frankfurt transmission system, designed and engineered by Michael von DolivoDobrowolsky of AEG in collaboration with Charles Eugene Lancelot Brown of Oerlikon (see Fig. 1), became operational near the end of August 1891 [9], but its story starts in March 1891 when Dolivo-Dobrowolsky described his three-phase system in a German article titled “Kraftübertragung mittels Wechselströmen von verschiedener Phase (Drehstrom)” [10] and in an English version in April–May of that year [11]. The word Drehstrom, an abridgement of Dreiphasenwechselstrom (three-phase ac), was coined by Dolivo-Dobrowolsky in his German article, and he translated that German word into “three-phase current” in his English article [11]."

I think you should consider putting Charles Eugene Lancelot Brown in the citation as well. You also need to use this papers as references as well.

Oskar von Miller also played important role. Its influence and role in the organization of the exhibition and transmission of electricity must also be considered. Moreover, it was probably his idea for advertising and development of the industry, and he had previous experience with other exhibitions.

- 4 - From Citation: "Already in 1896, they were adapted in Zielona Góra, Poland, then globally guided modern electrical engineering."
From same paper: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=8944322
On page 217 you can see a list of commercial three-phase ac systems mainly in Europe before 1893 (the paper is limited to this interval). However, the transmission of electricity at the exhibition created a wave of change around the world. By 1896, many changes had occurred in the world. The connection between the 1891 exhibition and the location of the power plant in 1896 in Poland is not clear. Why is there no interconnection with any other power plants built before 1896? There were enough of them.

Oerlikon company that worked with AEG on Lauffen–Frankfurt transmission system also built 4 commercial AC three-phase systems, including at 50 Hz from 1891 to 1893.

Therefore, from Milestone's point of view, this special connection between Lauffen–Frankfurt and Zielona Góra is not clear.

Best regards,
Ievgen Pichkalov

Re: Advocate responce -- Joachim Wiest (talk) 16:27, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

Dear Advocate,

thank you for your helpful reply. We adapted the proposal accordingly:

1. We updated the text to focus more on the achievement and the exhibiton in Frankfurt to: At the 1891 International Electrotechnical Exhibition, Oskar von Miller, Michael Dolivo-Dobrowolsky from AEG, Germany and Charles Eugene Lancelot Brown from Oerlikon, Switzerland, demonstrated the world’s first long distance (175km), high voltage (15kV), highly efficient (75%) Lauffen-Frankfurt electrical energy transmission of 300 HP, using the three-phase alternating current. This demonstration directly influenced the establishment of the dominant worldwide role of electric power transmission using three-phase alternating current systems.

2. We set the time to 1891.

3. We added Oskar von Miller and Charles Eugene Lancelot Brown accordingly.

4. We removed the milestone site in Poland.

In addition we added the citations to the proposal.

Thanks again and best regards,

Joachim

Reviewers’ responce -- Pichkalov (talk) 08:47, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

The general assessment of the proposal is positive. Suggested wording of the Plaque Citation is mainly accurate. The presented evidence in the proposal is of sufficient substance and mostly accurate to support the Plaque Citation. The proposed milestone doubtlessly represents a significant technical achievement. There are two remarks as follow. 1) In 1891, another patent for the three-phase electric power generation and transmission system was granted to Jonas Wenström, a Swedish engineer. He was mentioned in the proposal, but is not included in the citation. However, in fact, his invention directly corresponds to Long distance transmission of electrical power using three-phase alternating current, 1891-1912. 2) The Milestone Proposal is directly devoted to Long distance transmission of electrical power using three-phase alternating current, and mostly focuses on the Michał Doliwo-Dobrowolski's project of the world’s first transmission of the three-phase electric energy (on August 25, 1891) which took place from the hydroelectric power plant in Lauffen am Neckar to Frankfurt am Main. At the same time, the places proposed for the Plaque installation do not directly reflect the historical connection with this event. Taking into account the mentioned remarks may help to better justify the proposal accuracy and Plaque Citation.

Best regards,
Serhii Stepenko
Chernihiv Polytechnic National University

Re: Reviewers’ responce -- Joachim Wiest (talk) 16:34, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

Dear Reviewer,

thank you very much for the comments which helped to improve the proposal. We made the following adations:

1) We modified the citation text to "At the 1891 International Electrotechnical Exhibition, Oskar von Miller, Michael Dolivo-Dobrowolsky from AEG, Germany and Charles Eugene Lancelot Brown from Oerlikon, Switzerland, demonstrated the world’s first long distance (175km), high voltage (15kV), highly efficient (75%) Lauffen-Frankfurt electrical energy transmission of 300 HP, using the three-phase alternating current. This demonstration directly influenced the establishment of the dominant worldwide role of electric power transmission using three-phase alternating current systems." to put the focus more on the 1891 International Eletrotechnical Exhibition. We think it becomes evident that it is correct to mention Jonas Wenström in the proposal but not to mention him explicitly on the plaque text.

2) We removed the milestone site in Poland.

Thanks again and best regards,

Joachim

Proposed New Citation -- Bberg (talk) 23:43, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

Congratulations as this was all quite interesting to read. Please consider my 70-word citation which uses more efficient wording to add some clarifications and expand some of the abbreviations:

At the 1891 International Electrotechnical Exhibition, Oskar von Miller and Michael Dolivo-Dobrowolsky of Allgemeine Elektricitäts-Gesellschaft (AEG), Germany, and Charles Eugene Lancelot Brown from Oerlikon, Switzerland, demonstrated the world’s first long distance (175km), high voltage (15kV), highly efficient (75%) 300 horsepower electrical energy transmission using three-phase alternating current (AC) from Lauffen am Neckar to Frankfurt, Germany. Its success led to three-phase alternating current becoming dominant for long-distance electric power transmission worldwide.

Brian Berg, IEEE Milestone Subcommittee Chair/History Committee Vice-Chair

Re: Proposed New Citation -- Bberg (talk) 14:09, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

I have worked with the proposers on edits to the citation, the addition of a Justification section to support the inclusion of 3 persons' names in the citation, and formatting which breaks the "historical significance" section into multiple paragraphs for better reading. I now think that the proposal is ready for consideration by the History Committee.