Marcel Deprez was born on December 12, 1843, in Aillant-sur-Milleron. He was a French electrical engineer. He died on October 13, 1918, in Vincennes.

Biography

Deprez was born in Aillant-sur-Milleron, a rural area in France. He studied at the School of Mines in Paris but did not finish the course. However, he likely made a good impression because he was hired as a secretary to the school’s director, Charles Combes.

From 1876 to 1886, Deprez worked in Creil, where he performed the first experiments to send electrical power over long distances. At the International Exposition of Electricity in Paris in 1881, Deprez was responsible for showing an electricity distribution system that used direct current sent over long distances. The first successful test happened in 1882 during the Exposition of Electricity in the Glaspalast in Munich. There, he transmitted 1.5 kilowatts of power at 2 kilovolts over a distance of 35 miles.

Deprez tested his ideas in several locations, including La Chapelle, Grenoble, Vizille, Paris, and Creil. He eventually achieved transmission over thirty-five miles for industrial use. In 1889, René Thury continued Deprez’s method of connecting generators in series, creating commercial systems that delivered 20 megawatts of power at 125 kilovolts over 230 kilometers.