On Mon, 25 Nov 2013 16:26:14 -0500, Ralph Mowery wrote:

the AC power does not use the ground for anything but safety and
not one return leg.
There are a couple on here that will never get it.

If the statement is true, then you should be able to find at least
one reliable reference that supports your supposition. Right?

It's not like the question has never been asked before.

I provided more than a half dozen references which supported the
statement that the ground, in the typical USA AC transmission system,
is the return path to the electric company.

I admit, those references seemed to be from howto, school, and
physics web sites - but it was all that I could find.

However, I could not find a single reference that stated that the
ground is *not* the return path to the power company.

If it's true that the ground is not the return path, given that
clearly a LOT of sites say that it is, then why can't we find a
single reliable reference that explicitly refutes that assumption?

Again, I'm perfectly happy to be wrong if someone can prove they
are right. Merely stating that I'm wrong and that you are right
does nobody any good.

Let's see a single reliable reference that explicitly answers
the question by flatly refuting the (clearly common) assumption
that the ground *is* the return path back to the power company.