But given that most circuits in a house in the U.S. are limited to 15A or 20A (rare), you can't just double the current. Electric kettles in the U.S. are limited to 15A and therefore a max power of 1800W.
Thanks for the correction, I didn't know that in the UK kettles commonly have a power rating of up to 3KW. Looks like the EU tried to ban such high power appliances in 2014, but I don't think they did. MediaMarkt in Germany has many kettles with power rating of 2400W. This would be doable in the US (barely), but only with 20A wiring and NEMA 5-20 sockets, which are not very popular.
In the US, I've only ever seen 20A circuits in garages/workshops. Kinda wish we had gone for 220v like most European countries, but it's far too late to change that now.
I think of the US as the best of both worlds because we have split phase so you can get 240 if you want, but we run the safer 120 to most of the house.
Similarly, in Ireland where we run 230VAC single phase, three phase 400VAC allows up to 22kW to be delivered, which is about to become extremely useful as we migrate to electric transportation.
Also, on safety, I don't know the statistics, but subjectively, electricity feels much more dangerous in the US because of the plug and socket design.
Code requires 20amp circuits in the kitchen (and garage). However it allows 15amp outlets so long as you can pass the full 20amps through, which all do.
Or did you mean. 230 volts?. Every time I accidentally come in contact with mains (only twice in my life, but that is more than enough) I'm glad we are lower, and wish it was less.
In any case, regardless of geographical location, voltage doesn't kill you -- current does.
In Australia most household circuits are ~230V AC at 50Hz at 10 Amp, though 15 Amp circuits are not uncommon (the earth pin - we have three pins in a frowny-face configuration, earth being the lower / vertical one) on those are much larger, so you can't accidentally put that into a standard 10A (female) socket.
We have three-phase options too, which is ~ 415V AC - not something that's commonly used in residential environments.
In any case, 230V @ 10A is less dangerous than 110V at 15A.
V=ir. That simple equation is why you are wrong. Double the voltage and the current goes up. The human body is high enough resistance that you won't blow a fuse so current depends on voltage.
Voltage determines the current that actually flows during a shock. The amperage ratings you are citing are the maximum amperage that can be drawn before the breaker pops. This protects from fire, it does nothing to prevent death from shocks, in any country. You will be burnt to a crisp before you trip the current-limiting breaker, in any country.
High voltages are dangerous because they can overcome the resistance of human skin, which then enables current to flow.
Right, so assuming everyone's got dry hands, or comparably dry hands, then you'd expect to see lower fatality rates in the USA (and other countries that use ~110V) compared to countries that use 230-240V.
Does that hypothesis actually align with the data?
I'm struggling to find good figures that spell this out on a region by region basis.
The data are often muddied, f.e. by including lightning strikes, ladders or trucks hitting overhead high-voltage power lines, self-harm / suicide attempts, etc.
For example, some Australian data for a 2-year period [1]
> 55 deaths involving electrical injury - 50 male, 5 female
> 8 were lightning strikes
> 17 were intentional self-harm
> 18 were were due to exposure to other specified electric current
Either way that's about 26 / year out of a population of ~25M ~= 1 per million.
In the USA I'm finding:
> Electrocution is the fifth leading cause of occupational injury death
> 41% of cases involved overhead power lines
Alternatively [3] for USA:
> Electrocution is sixth among causes of workplace deaths
> Electrical hazards cause more than 300 deaths
I was including lightning strikes in the AU numbers, but the US numbers were electrical (lines, domestic, construction, etc) only.
So fatality ratios skew higher in the USA than AU, at least. The numbers are quite low in both cases, so the ostensible safety benefits of 110V at 15-20A may not be terribly compelling in practice.
