redundancy

 
Pronunciation: /rɪˈdʌnd(ə)nsi/

noun (plural redundancies)

[mass noun]
  • the state of being not or no longer needed or useful: the redundancy of 19th-century heavy plant machinery
  • British the state of being no longer in employment because there is no more work available: the factory’s workers face redundancy [count noun]: the car giant is expected to announce around 5,000 redundancies
  • Engineering the inclusion of extra components which are not strictly necessary to functioning, in case of failure in other components: a high degree of redundancy is built into the machinery installation