Australian electrical contractor PJ Corporate Electrical reckons that in around nine out of ten projects it encounters, the electrical infrastructure hasn’t been adequately considered before new technology is specified. The faults it lists are basic ones: a UPS sized wrong, clearances that don’t work, a board with no spare capacity, or a design that leaves no allowance for what the customer intends to do next. That figure is the company’s own count from its own jobs, not an industry survey.
The claim appears in a sponsored feature published by Electrical Connection in October 2026. Read it with the badge in mind: it’s commercial content promoting one contractor and its 23-year partnership with Schneider Electric, and none of the figures in it have been independently verified.
Worth a look anyway, because the underlying problem is one every sparkie working commercial sites is already meeting. Higher-density computing is being dropped into buildings designed around completely different load assumptions, and the first trade to cop the consequences is the one holding the test leads.
The 5% that stopped a cancer machine
The sharpest example in the piece is a medical facility where a voltage fluctuation of just 5% was enough to make a machine used in cancer treatment terminate its operation. Patients were booked through the day, so an intermittent power issue wasn’t an electrical nuisance, it was a clinical one.
Working out where the fault sat was the hard part. “The source of the problem was proving difficult to isolate.” Equipment, site, incoming supply: all three were suspects.
A power-quality study by PJ Corporate Electrical pinned it on harmonic-related fluctuations. The company then sized and installed an active harmonic filter, and according to the article, no further power-quality issues have been reported since, with monthly site reviews recording a stable power factor of 0.99 and compensation output averaging 32% per phase. It puts the payback at 1.6 years off the energy savings.
That’s a job you can’t find on a drawing. Harmonics come out of non-linear loads, the variable-speed drives, LED drivers, switch-mode supplies and rectifiers that make up most of what hangs off a modern commercial board, and they don’t announce themselves on a single clamp-meter reading taken on a quiet Tuesday. Catching them means leaving loggers on long enough to see the site cycle through a full working week, then sizing the fix off measured data rather than nameplate ratings.
As the article puts it:
“Infrastructure that receives little attention when everything is working can become business-critical when it isn’t.”
Grid capacity is the long lead item
The argument running through the feature is that a client’s technology plan and their electrical plan can no longer be drawn up separately.
“A facility can operate perfectly well today and still be unprepared for what the business wants to do tomorrow,” it says. Limited switchboard capacity, single points of failure in the distribution, and an installation with no headroom all sit quietly until somebody asks the building to do more.
Timing is where it bites. “Some of these constraints only become visible once a project is already underway, when addressing them becomes more disruptive, expensive and time-consuming.”
The line worth sticking on the whiteboard in the office is this one: “Where additional grid capacity is required, those conversations can take months and need to begin well before deployment.” If the answer to a client’s AI rack is more incoming supply, that’s a network application with a lead time attached, not a weekend shutdown you can slot in after the racks land.
What it looks like with the tools in your hand
This style of work is a different animal to a fitout. It starts with survey and metering, moves to a staged upgrade in a building that can’t go dark, and lands you in night and weekend shutdown windows, temporary supplies, and a lot of coordination with IT people who’ve never heard the word “harmonic”.
It also changes who gets the job. Arrive after the equipment is ordered and you’re quoting a workaround. Get in before the purchase order and you’re scoping the board, the distribution and the supply around what the site will need in two years.
The feature describes exactly that on a recent AI-related deployment, where the contractor was brought in early enough to check whether the customer’s existing switchboard could carry the proposed equipment. Those conversations surfaced plans for further expansion, which changed the infrastructure decision. The customer had a lower-cost alternative on the table and went the other way. About a year later, the article says, they came back for the next stage of expansion.
What to do with it
Treat the nine-in-ten number as one contractor’s experience rather than a statistic about the industry, because that’s what it is. The useful part is the question behind it, and that one costs nothing to ask.
Next time a client wants gear added to an existing board, ask what stage two looks like before you price stage one. Ask whether anyone has logged power quality on that site, or whether everybody’s working off a load schedule written when the building was commissioned. And if the honest answer is that the supply won’t carry it, say so early, because the network conversation is measured in months and the one thing nobody can retrofit is time.
All fixed electrical work in Australia stays with a licensed electrician, which is precisely why the person holding the licence is the one who should be in the room before the equipment is bought, not after it’s sitting on the dock.
Frequently asked questions
Why do AI computing installs cause power quality problems?
AI racks and other non-linear loads such as variable-speed drives, LED drivers and switch-mode supplies generate harmonics that can cause voltage fluctuations. In one case cited, a 5% fluctuation was enough to shut down a cancer treatment machine.
How long does it take to get more grid capacity for a commercial site?
According to the contractor cited, those conversations with the network can take months, so they need to start well before any new equipment is deployed, not after it arrives on site.
Who should check a switchboard before new equipment is ordered?
All fixed electrical work in Australia stays with a licensed electrician, so a licensed electrician should assess the board, distribution and supply before equipment is purchased, not after.
Sourced from Electrical Connection. Original article.
