When power failure hits a manufacturing plant, the results can be costly and far-reaching. Case in point: When German automobile chipmaker Infineon Technologies’ primary manufacturing sites lost power in 2021, all production stopped.
While the power outage lasted only 20 minutes, it took the company several more hours to bring all its equipment back online and resume production. What sounds like a minimal interruption left a negative impact on the worldwide supply chain for automotive chips, which were already in short supply. This story underscores the necessity of reliable power in manufacturing. Even a surge or dip in power can cause major problems such as equipment damage and the need to restart and recalibrate robotics on the factory floor.
Let’s take a closer look at the most common causes of power outages in manufacturing, specific challenges faced by Texas-based facilities, and ways you can mitigate risks.
Power failures can spring from several causes, including external factors that affect the main grid and internal issues such as short circuits or system overload. Some of the most common causes of outages include:
Lightning strikes, high winds, snow, and ice storms can all take down power lines and interrupt operations of the main grid. Eighty percent of all power outages reported in the U.S. between 2000–2023 were weather-related. Even if there’s not a hurricane or a blizzard in play, extremely low or high temperatures can overwhelm the public grid to the point of failure, such as what happened during the February 2021 “Big Freeze” in Texas.
Other natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods, fires, and landslides can also cause power outages — sometimes across a broad area, if a substation or other main grid infrastructure is impacted. In some cases, power companies will proactively shut off power to an area during dangerous conditions to prevent ignition in areas at increased risk for wildfires.
When a regional power grid is overloaded and under stress, it can break down, causing blackouts. With growing demand for energy in the U.S. to support new technologies such as generative AI, the nation’s power grid is already burdened by an increasing strain.
Without adequate maintenance or parts replacement, an aging power grid begins to break down. Beyond power lines and poles, other elements of the power grid vulnerable to failure include transformers, substations, circuit breakers, and generators. With much of the U.S. grid infrastructure dating back to the 1960s and 1970s, most of the nation’s power equipment is due for a major overhaul.
At manufacturing facilities, a power failure means unexpected equipment downtime — an expensive surprise that can cost industrial businesses nearly $125,000 per hour. If your plant uses robotics and other connected technologies, a power surge or outage potentially means lost data, wasted materials on half-finished products, and time-consuming reboots.
Downtime caused by a power outage can trigger ripple effects that stretch far beyond the original incident. Some of these consequences might include:
Paying your workforce through downtime can be pricey — but sending them home only to call them back for overtime hours could be even more so. In the U.S., the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) requires employers to pay 1.5 times the regular pay rate for any hours beyond the standard 40-hour work week. That means paying your workers for overtime hours will cost you 50% more — which can add up quickly.
Extended downtime can cause manufacturers to miss deadlines for filling orders, creating bottlenecks in the supply chain. And missed deadlines could result in lost revenue when you are required to pay penalties or offer refunds to customers — not to mention the impacts on your company’s reputation.
What started as a power failure could become equipment failure. If a power surge or outage causes your factory floor machinery to malfunction, the downtime will extend past power restoration until that equipment is repaired. According to some estimates, up to 42 percent of unplanned downtime in industrial manufacturing results from equipment failure.
Downtime can also result in higher insurance premiums, inventory shortages, supply chain issues, and decreased workforce morale.
Texas manufacturers are facing a serious problem with power outages. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) predicts that energy demand will increase by 72% by 2030, or approximately 62 GW of additional load. Largely due to rapid economic and population growth in Texas, the huge increase in demand could outpace the construction of new power infrastructure to support it. Decreased availability of power could trigger more power outages — costing manufacturers millions of dollars.
U.S. News & World Report ranks Texas as #28 in the nation for power grid reliability, based on data from the U.S. Department of Energy on how many minutes of power outages the average customer experiences each year. Other recent data highlights Texas as the state that’s had the most power outages over the past five years — a total of 263, “each lasting an average of 160 minutes and impacting an estimated 172,000 Texans.”
There are several reasons Texas is becoming more vulnerable to power outages and shortages:
The history of utilities in the U.S. is complex, involving decisive intervention by the federal government in 1935 to regulate the industry and break up monopolies. But the Public Utility Holding Company Act didn’t apply to companies that bought and sold power within a single state — and that’s when Texas opted to keep its grid separate from the regional markets surrounding it. Unlike utilities in other states that tried the same move to maintain control, Texas had the resources to pull it off, and remains the only U.S. state with its own grid.
While Texas typically has the resources to self-sustain when it comes to power production and consumption, there are times — such as in the winter of 2021 — when equipment malfunctions and the grid cannot supply the power the state’s residents’ need. In those cases, there’s no way to get power from other states.
With the aforementioned estimated 72% increase in demand for energy in Texas over the next few years, the state’s grid will likely struggle to keep up. State utilities are working to build out the needed infrastructure, but it’s highly possible the public grid will be subject to vulnerabilities along the way.
Manufacturers can take proactive steps to prevent power failures and equipment downtime, such as:
A self-sufficient energy system that’s capable of operating independently, a microgrid can manage power for your entire business site or manufacturing plant, maintaining a steady flow of conditioned power — even when the public grid is down.
While building out a proprietary microgrid can be costly and complicated, advanced energy solutions like R3Di® give you the power of a fully integrated turnkey microgrid solution that enables integration with renewables and the grid — so your organization is not fully dependent on either one.
Incorporating connected IoT sensors and other monitoring devices on your manufacturing equipment can help anticipate equipment issues and diagnose problems quickly following a power outage.
Using software that monitors the public grid and issues alerts on peak demand times can help you anticipate the risk of outages and know when to supplement with backup or reserve power.
Look for ways to reduce energy consumption at your manufacturing site to help lower the risk of electrical system overload.
G.A. Wintzer & Son Co., a family-owned and operated company that purchases and removes used cooking oil, meat scraps, and animal co-products from food processing facilities and restaurants and recycles them back into usable products, needed a way to add resilient, reliable power backup and monitoring to its manufacturing facility in Wapakoneta, Ohio.
The facility suffered from inconsistent power quality provided by the local utility, costing the company tens of thousands of dollars in damages to sensitive and expensive equipment.
To solve its power problems, G.A. Wintzer chose to install a 4,000 kW R3Di® System at the facility. A utility-grade, onsite power generation system that delivers conditioned, uninterrupted power to end users, R3Di® relies on a self-contained, turnkey power platform installed without requiring an interconnection agreement or costly public utility upgrades. It’s capable of providing instantaneous full-load pickup — which means no “blip” or interruption to manufacturing equipment — in the event of an outage and sustaining power during long-duration blackouts. Relying on safe and sustainable lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4) battery chemistry for energy storage, R3Di® can store and provide up to 1 MW of power and includes a natural gas generator for additional support.
With Grove365, the company can now uncover savings with the help of our energy management team. We use historical data and advanced analytics to predict peak demand times — helping to avoid increased charges. We work with a large supplier network to secure the most competitive rates and terms based on a company's needs.
Now is the time to take a proactive approach to minimizing the cost of power outages. To maximize your site’s energy resiliency, consider the R3Di® system, an advanced solution for energy efficiency and autonomy.
Sources:
https://www.climatecentral.org/climate-matters/weather-related-power-outages-rising
https://energy.utexas.edu/research/ercot-blackout-2021
https://www.sce.com/outage-center/outage-information/psps
https://new.abb.com/news/detail/107660/abb-survey-reveals-unplanned-downtime-costs-125000-per-hour
https://dmsiworks.com/blog/how-to-avoid-the-pitfalls-of-missing-deadlines-in-manufacturing
https://www.ercot.com/files/docs/2024/04/08/2024_RTP_Load_Review_Update_April_2024_RPG.pdf
https://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/eia861
https://www.governing.com/infrastructure/texas-has-had-the-most-power-outages-over-past-5-years
https://www.utilitydive.com/news/ercot-transmission-planning-2030-load-growth-projections/714104/