The explosion of industrial automation in the latter half of the 20th Century has brought untold benefit to today’s business processes, delivering convenience and cost savings from higher efficiency production and output.
But as with any ‘efficiency dividend’, what you gain on swings, you inevitably lose on roundabouts.
Indeed, our increasing dependence on energy-hungry automated processes is contributing to a host of systemic power distortion issues, leading to increased costs, protracted equipment downtime and dramatic energy losses that negate many of the efficiency gains of automation.