Alternating Current

Capacitive Reactance

In a DC circuit, there is no current through a capacitor -- or through this simple circuit that contains a capacitor.

In a simple resistor circuit, we defined resistance R by

V = I R

In a similar fashion, we can write

V_C = I X_C

where V_C is the maximum voltage across the capacitor and I is the maximum current through the circuit. X_C is called the "capacitive reactance"; it is analogous to resistance and is also measured in ohms (). The capacitive reactance is given by

rms Values	Return to ToC		Inductive Reactance

(c) Doug Davis, 2002; all rights reserved