Electrical Safety: How to Keep Yourself and Your Home Safe

Learn how to protect yourself and your home from electrical hazards with these essential safety tips.

Electrical Safety: How to Keep Yourself and Your Home Safe

Ensuring the safety of your home and workplace from electrical hazards is essential for everyone's wellbeing. To guarantee that you and your family are safeguarded, it's important to comprehend the fundamentals of electrical safety and the precautions you can take to avoid accidents. When it comes to electrical safety, the most important advice is to keep all electrical appliances and cables out of reach of children. Store items such as toasters, blenders, and electric kettles on high shelves or in locked cabinets.

Additionally, make sure that all cables are stored securely to prevent damage. It's also essential to use all electrical equipment correctly. A capacitor stores energy and, if not properly discharged when removed, can cause an electrical shock. If cabinets cannot be closed or if an electrical hazard cannot be completely closed, protectors, barriers, or insulating materials must be used.

Before continuing with any work, check all cables, the outer metal cover of the service panel, and any other hanging cables with an electrical tester. Installing ground fault circuit breakers (GFCI) is also recommended as they help prevent electrical incidents such as shocks, ground faults, fires, overheating, and destruction of cable insulation. Other home electrical safety tips include preparing for the elements and checking if new appliances are on the list of nationally recognized testing laboratories (NRTL).If any appliance experiences a mild electrical shock, stop using it until a qualified electrician checks for problems. Ask a qualified electrician who knows electrical safety regulations to install additional outlets in rooms where you frequently use extension cords. Electrical hazards at work represent a large percentage of accidents when equipment does not work properly. Finally, a good electrical installation consists of having fixed electrical equipment and cables out of the way (and out of reach of pets).