The wires between the electric utility and the main breaker (this
includes the electric meter) are the only wires than have to handle
200A. These should be very large copper wires or enormous aluminum
wires (I don't recall the exact minimum sizes for 200A).

Yeah they are BIG aluminum wires.


You can only have one circuit going to the shed.

Is that a code thing? I need two circuits, and was planning either to do
two 12g wires running from two 15A breakers, or a larger wire (I guess
based on above post 10g for a 240V/30A circuit), and doing it like you
describe below. At any rate, I am burying them, and was going to run
some PVC conduit anyway. It is not that expensive, and looks like it
just snaps together. Gonna rent a trench digger, I think. And I will use
a GFCI at the house to be on the safe side, and in the shed too, I
suppose. But woiuld GFCI in the house not be required if I was running a
subpanel and had GFCI in the shed?

Thanks for your help.

If 120V/20A is
sufficient, you can directly bury a strand of UF cable and it only has
to be covered 12 inches if it is protected by a GFCI at the house. If
120V/20A is not enough, you probably want to run at least a 240V/30A
circuit to a small subpanel (it has to be rated for "service equipment",
but almost all of them are) and split it into smaller circuits at the
shed. This larger circuit would have to be run in conduit and/or be
buried a lot deeper, (or run it overhead with UF or triplex or quadplex
cable) but it would not need GFCI protection at the house. (You will
want GFCI outlets installed in the shed.)


Overhead wiring is more trouble than it sounds like (don't ask me how I
know this) so I recommend buried cable if at all possible.

Best regards,
Bob