What Is Unit of Electrical Power?

The watt is a unit used to measure electrical power.

The watt, the main unit used to measure electrical power, was named for James Watt, a British engineer and inventor. It is a part of the International System of Units (SI), the global guide for weights and measures, adopted in 1960.

History

Due to technological advances, scientists needed a universal form of measurement. The first effort to standardize measurement was the MKS system (meter-kilogram-second). In 1948 three new units were added---the newton, the joule and the watt.

Watt

Encyclopedia Britannica defines a watt as "the power that in one second gives rise to energy of one joule." The U.S. Energy Information Administration defines a watt as "the rate of energy transfer equivalent to 1 ampere flowing under a pressure of 1 volt at unit power factor."

Newton

A newton is a unit of force "which gives to a mass of one kilogram an acceleration of one meter per second per second," according to Encyclopedia Britannica.

Joule

A joule is a unit of energy defined as the work done when the point of application of a newton is displaced one meter in the direction of the force.

Ampere

The ampere, added to SI in 1960, is the unit of measurement "of electric current produced in a circuit by 1 volt acting through a resistance of 1 ohm," according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

References

• U.S. Energy Information Administration: Electric Conversions