Did you know that the power that comes out of your plug sockets and other outlets can vary in quality? It is true that there are strict rules governing the quality of power to ensure that individuals, businesses and organisations receive consistently high levels of power. However, sometimes errors can occur within systems that bring power quality down significantly. Multiple different power issues can end up costing your business money.
When power quality drops it can cause variety of issues. For example it can cause malfunctions with equipment as well as surges, voltage sags and even power outages. Not only can this be frustrating to have to deal with, it can cause a whole range of additional issues. This can be especially problematic if you work with systems that require constant power.
If you are concerned that the power in your building is not up the correct standard you could hire a power quality monitor to check it. The cost of doing so will be offset by the benefit of establishing the quality of your power and then getting the issue resolved. If you have poor power quality, it could be costing your business a serious amount of money every year. Here are some of the key factors given by Outram Research in the costs relating to power quality.
Downtime
If your business relies on electrical equipment to do its work then it is vital that you are getting the right power quality. When power quality drops below a certain level it can cause equipment to begin to fail. Naturally when this happens you will experience periods of outage and downtime where you cannot continue to work properly.
Clearly any downtime that low power quality causes your business is going to begin mounting up in cost. How long could your business last without its equipment functioning correctly? Many organisations would begin losing money very quickly during downtime. So, it is essential that you get the issue dealt with as quickly as possible. This can help avoid lost working hours in your companyl, which would cost you as well.
Equipment issues
There can be many issues relating the costs of equipment problems caused by lower than usual power quality. Aside from the aforementioned cost of downtime to your business generally, it is also true that equipment that runs on low quality power can be damaged. Many pieces of electronic equipment require very specific power levels to work correctly. When equipment runs on poor power quality it can cause a huge range of problems.
In the worst case scenario, equipment can be damaged to the point that it needs to be replaced. Even if the problems are not so severe, lower power quality can reduce the lifespan of equipment. This means that you need to replace it sooner than you would usually. Therefore, you can avoid this additional cost if the quality of power was at the correct level.
Maintenance
It is also worth pointing out that if you are unaware of the low quality of your power, you will likely assume that the equipment problems are simply the fault of the equipment. This could result in spending a significant amount of money on maintenance. Of course, this maintenance will not resolve the issue because would likely face the issue again.
It may be the case that fixing any power quality issue would require a cost but doing so would save you the significant ongoing costs of maintenance.
Additional energy cost
Finally, it is worth remembering that poor power quality causes issues such as power spikes as well as affecting the amount of power that is consumed by equipment. Ultimately this will mean that your energy bills will rise to very high levels unnecessarily. If you have found yourself with unexpectedly high energy bills alongside a range of equipment problems, it may well be the case that you have a problem with your power quality. You should take steps to deal with those problems as soon as possible.
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