In its 2017 Infrastructure Report Card, the American Society of Civil Engineers assigned a “D+” to the US’ aging energy infrastructure.
Just a few weeks after the report was released, Los Angeles, New York and San Francisco were hit by major power outages on the same day. Mass transit was in chaos as the electrical outages caused the failure of signals and station lights. Office workers were stranded in elevators and hospital operating rooms were shut down. And businesses, factories, and homes went dark. For anywhere between four and ten hours, it was utter chaos for hundreds of thousands of people.
But power outages aren’t a one-time event. In 2016, there were 3,879 power outages in USA, affecting 18 million people. They cost businesses more than 150 billion dollars in losses. And that’s only in the US. Power outages happen everywhere. And they cost businesses billions and billions of dollars in Europe, Latin America, Africa and Asia.