Eli5: How high voltage (lightning, HV charged metal sphere) discharge to earth without earthing, while battery requires both terminal to complete circuit?
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Electric discharge through the air is called “arcing”. The static electricity you feel when you touch a doorknob is the same type of action as a lightning strike.
Air is an insulator – it has a high resistance to electric current. But that doesn’t mean that it completely blocks current. As the electric field in the air between the charged objects increases (voltage increases), it begins to ionize the air itself, ripping free electrons. This creates a path of least resistance, which allows the discharge of current.
Given a high enough voltage, electricity can discharge across any insulator.
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