History

They wrote the history of electricity

None of the industrial and domestic applications which ensure our efficiency at work and well-being in the home would exist without the genius of researchers who, over the past two hundred years, have constantly broken new ground in the exploitation of energy. Let us remember some of these major figures in the history of electricity : 1820  - Christian Oersted, a Danish physicist, discovered the existence of the magnetic field created by electric currents.
1825  - Sturgeon (Great Britain) invented the electromagnet.
1833  - Michael Faraday, an English physicist, developed the theory of electrostatic influence, defined the laws of electrolysis and discovered electromagnetic induction.
1837  - Samuel Morse, a US physicist, invented the electric telegraph and its alphabet.
1859  - Gaston Planté, a French physicist, built the first electric battery.
1866  - Werner von Siemens (Germany), author of a remarkable series of studies on electricity used for the production of power, developed the electric dynamo based on the research of Wheatstone and Varley (Great Britain).
1868  - Zénobe Gramme, a Belgian electrician, invented the first industrial dynamo permitting the production of an electric current.
1873  - Aristide Bergès, a French engineer, first generated hydroelectric power.
1877  - Invention of electric welding.
1878  - Thomas Edison, the US physicist, invented a number of electrical devices, including the light bulb.
1879  - Siemens (Germany) built, for the Berlin Exhibition, the first electric locomotive pulling a train of wagons for passenger transport.
1881  - Siemens (Germany) built the first electric tramway line in Berlin.
1883  - Lucien Goulard (France) and Dixon Gibbs (England), both engineers, developed what is considered to be the forerunner of the "transformer".
1885  - The Ganz Company patented the "electric transformer", following joint research by the Hungarian engineers Zipernowski-Deri and Blathy.
1887  - Heinrich Hertz, a German physicist, discovered electric or Hertzian waves, together with the photo-electric effect.
1889  - von Delivo Dobroewiski (Germany) developed and patented the "triphase transformer".
1890  - Marey (France) developed a device able to take up to 16 photos a second.
1892  - Edison created his kinetoscope able to show a succession of images creating the impression of movement.
1893  - Elster and Geitel (Germany) developed the photoelectric cell.
1895  - The Lumière brothers (France) presented their device for film projection.

1898  - First electric power station opened in Oisquerecq with a power of more than 100 kW. (The present installed power in Belgium is 15,339,00 kW).

CEBEC. 1923-1998

75 years in the service of the quality of life

75 years of professional activity to ensure safe and efficient human activity with the comfort of electricity in the home, at work and during leisure activities.

This reality is the result of 75 years of constant efforts to study every product and device and to define standards ensuring safety of use and quality of components. 75 years devoted to controlling tens of thousands of products and awarding the CEBEC quality mark.

Homage to our predecessors

Back at the very beginning of the century, our predecessors pooled their professionalism to ensure the efficient and problem-free comfort of electricity. They formed companies, drew up safety and quality standards, and created the bodies to ensure their application.

The Belgian Electrotechnical Committee

Founded in 1884, the Belgian Society of Electricians (SBE) already had 230 members in 1885 and experienced growing success. It defined its mission in 1906 and in 1909 founded the Belgian Electrotechnical Committee (CEB), charged with the following tasks :

1. To define safety and quality standards for electrotechnical equipment
2. To ensure compliance of equipment with its standards by means of detailed examinations and testing by an approved laboratory.
3. To award quality marks to equipment manufactured according to its recommendations.