ABSTRACT
The chapter describes the principles of the most common precautions that are available to prevent accidents. The safety precautions described so far have concentrated on hardware and technical design solutions. The most important precaution is to ensure that the people carrying out live work are competent for the task or are being closely supervised by someone who is competent. Live work should only be undertaken after a risk assessment has been conducted, the risks identified and the appropriate safety precautions have been determined. Increased safety is attainable by reducing the potential shock voltage to well below mains voltage. In the UK the most common reduced voltage system operates at 110 V three-phase or single phase. For an even greater degree of safety, lower voltages may be used together with techniques to prevent the extra-low voltage conductors becoming energised at higher voltages under fault conditions.
