How do transients cause damage? Transients can cause data transfer glitches where "0’s” are misinterpreted as "1's" in a digital data transmission. Bad data can and has shut down operations. The overall cost of any kind of disruption is staggering. Manpower is expensive, as people stand around waiting for equipment to reset. Production is lost in batch runs. Many industries require a continuous production flow or else the product must be discarded. Transients have a cumulative effect much like static discharges. One of the fundamental purposes of surge suppression is to limit voltages to microelectronic equipment such as integrated circuit chips. Chips are composed of layered silicon substrates that are permanently damaged when excessive voltage “punches-through” a silicon layer. This occurs at the micron level and is difficult to troubleshoot. The appropriate repair is to replace suspect components. A rare but worst case transient scenario is substantial destruction. This is usually caused when a component fails due to a transient and an unusual chain of events leads to catastrophic failure.