I don't think a resistive load would be effected by frequency in any significant way; a motor, sure. Also if a lower frequency means more efficiency, lets just change the whole grid to 1Hz.

Done, I'm up for the Nobel piece Prize.

The flickering of the light bulbs might cause some complaints.

And no, I don't think that 50 Hz gives you more electricity.

quote:

Originally posted by Skins2881:

Are you sure about that? I can't see how and resistive load would be changed by frequency. In fact I don't think it would affect anything except motors, which spin faster/slower based on changes to frequency.

Without really getting in the weeds, it's generally correct to say that a resistive load would stay constant through line frequency variations. However, motors are not the only devices that are affected by line frequency differences.

For example, holding voltage constant:

• Electric clocks that use line frequency to keep time would be affected.
  
• Incandescent lamps glow dimmer at lower line frequencies.
  
• Fluorescent lamp flicker can become objectionable at lower line frequencies.
  
• Power transformers behave differently at different line frequencies.
  
• Transformer-based power supplies behave differently at different line frequencies. The rectified voltage ripple frequencies will be different requiring different levels of filtering making it more difficult to produce power supplies of equal quality at different frequencies.
  
• And, of course, you being an experienced electrician, you deal with or have at least been exposed to power factor considerations for certain large industrial installations of certain types of equipment..."ELI the ICE man" and all that stuff. Both the inductive and capacitive reactance formulas associated with power factor remediation have "f" (frequency) as an element of their respective formulas. Change the "f" and you change the reactance. Change the reactance and you change the load.
  
• Re motors' behavior, yes they will run at different speeds as line frequency changes but only to a certain point. In other words, increasing the line frequency from 50Hz to 2,000Hz will not necessarily produce a smooth, extremely high-speed motor that doesn't use any electricity.

So, your instinct is correct regarding the many applications for AC where line frequency can be a factor. And, no, I'm not a licensed master electrician so take the above for precisely what it's worth.