When I put a radiation-tester near an electricity socket, with nothing connected to it, it shows a large amount of electric radiation – about 800 V/m (it starts beeping and saying that the radiation is "harmful" already at 40 V/m).
When I plug in a simple 4x multi-socket (again with nothing connected to it) the radiation grows beyond 2000 V/m, which is the maximum of the radiation-tester. Moreover, even at the wall about 1 meter above the multi-socket, there is about 1000 V/m radiation; 1 meter to the right there is 100 V/m radiation (in the other directions there is no radiation at this distance).
My questions are:
- Why is the radiation so large if nothing is connected to the socket?
- Does it waste electricity, and if so, how much?
Best Answer
First, understand that this "radiation meter" is a piece of junk that has no scientific basis for the numbers it is reporting. It is a device designed to scare you into buying "protective" equipment you do not need, and it is deliberately miscalibrated and exaggerating wildly
There is certainly an electromagnetic field around any live wire, and a small amount of power is indeed lost when that field induces eddy currents in nearby conductors. That's so far below the amount of power used by anything you would actually plug in that it's effectively zero on the scale of what you're paying for, even when you consider the whole house rather than one outlet. But it is possible to pick it up with suitable equipment -- noncontact testers of several types are a standard tool in an electrician's kit -- and your meter is apparently picking up that signal but lying to you about how strong it is.