First, let me provide you with the definition of load balancing, I am
referring to, it is coming from the electric power grid to avoid crashing of
the network during peak demand.
There are several techniques on an electric grid that are used, I will
not go into detail. However I want to make the clear analogy with
Bpost/PostNL current situation, where it is having a peak demand in
parcel delivery and is having difficulties to cope with it, and a logic
explanation will follow why Bpost reacts the way it is doing.
When u have normal electricity usage in an electricity grid this works
fine. The issue comes with peak demands (from industry or from households
in winter for example) where u have the highest cost as a network
manager. So you have a lot of costs to manage these loads. This is also
the case for water usage during a world cup soccer half time by the way.
In electricity terms, the highest cost is when you have peak demand, as
supply falls short. In case of emergency of peak demand, there are some
power stations that are awaiting, and can be turned on very fast. The
peak is more expensive, and prices are higher for these peaks for industry,
incentives are given to go off the grid quickly, etc...
Covid in hospitals 2020
The hospitals are not able to manage peak demand in terms of IC intensive
care; the load balancing that happens than is to #lockdown the whole country,
in order to reduce the speed of spread of the virus
Covid test lab bottlenecks
Accredited labs were not able to cope with the demand in October 2020 , and
the usage therefore becomes counterproductive (too many waiting time for test
results not effective)
The labs become a bottle neck September 2020
The load balancing here becomes a management trick, where u make a
differentiation between some urgent cases OK, and offloading the other to
society that you need to stay #10 days at home. (cost offloaded to social
security system, ...)
So here is my statement. Pandemic peak comes at a higher cost. The
system looks for a load balancing and that equilibrium will put an external
pressure on society to keep its own optimal equilibrium.
Other classic examples:
Highways traffic jam - toll increase
Going back to Paris, the toll is increased, so that peak demand can be
offoaded: only the ones that wnt to pay highter are taking the road,
others reduce their w.e. time and come back earliere.
Schools building
The load balancing is quite clear. When you know demographic growth,
you can beforehand foresee the number of places needed so that there is a
balance between number of places in schools and number of pupils. But why
does it get wrong anyway? Where is the pressure offloaded of non
equilibrium?
B-post
So let's come to the title of the article the B post Belgian post announced
a bottleneck in parcels with near doubling of parcels in the period. PostNL did
the same for other reasons recently also.
How is the offloading working here? It is working on the two sides:
- Left - supply increase of costs (small shops need to pay more)
- Right - demand /offer : explanation in press that probably package
will not be delivered, and so creating hesitation at the online shop customers.
This is the load balancing technique. There is a fixed cost for
managing a system in equilibrium (maybe also top management bonus) Than the
costs of peak can be offloaded/externalised to society and there is no
accountability.
Bpost and the management is only looking at itself and does so not looking
how society is working and not setting the example as a public company.
Conclusion
Probably, a lot of the business models will really need to integrate their
impact on society and the environment even more, looking at reducing the
negative and increasing the positive externalities. SDGs and other
sustainable models in the centre could create this broader load balancing in
society.
As you come at the ed of the article, bravo, hope you enjoyed it.
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