Safe home electrics: what everyone should know

You turn on the electric shower (a common Brazilian instant water heater) and the circuit breaker trips. The kitchen socket gets hot. The electrician says he "has to redo everything" and you can't tell if that is true. This course is for that moment.

In 3 hours, split into 6 short lessons, you learn what voltage, current and power are, with examples from your own home. You recognize the four electrical risks at home (shock, short circuit, overload and fire). You learn what earthing (grounding) and the RCD (residual current device) are for, and you read your own distribution board. At the end, you know what is safe to do yourself, what needs a licensed professional, and how to request and evaluate a quote based on NBR 5410.

The content was written by Marcelo Nogueira Souza, an electrical technician and HVAC-R technician. E-Nogueira has carried out installations since 2014, in homes, shops and farms around São João da Boa Vista, São Paulo. Each lesson has a worked example with numbers, a checklist, recall questions and a practical task in your own home. The course closes with a final project: the map of your distribution board, a list of risks and a plan of 3 actions.

This course does not train electricians and does not replace NR-10 training (NR-10 is Brazil's regulation on safety in electrical work). It trains a client who knows what to ask and a beginner who knows where to stop.

Base técnica: Brazilian standards from ABNT (the Brazilian Association of Technical Standards), mainly ABNT NBR 5410:2004 (corrected version 2008) (the Brazilian low-voltage installations standard, derived from IEC 60364) and related ones. The principles hold in any country. If you are outside Brazil, check your local electrical code (the NEC in the US, or the IEC 60364-based code in your country).