Advanced automation here refers to sophisticated industrial systems capable of maintaining and repairing themselves so that thay need almost no human interaction to operate, apart from top level guidance. Not being reliant on human effort to scale, these systems when linked together with an automated transport network could hugely magnify our capability for production allowing us to create as much of anything that is needed while releasing people from mindless labour. In Western countries many industrial process are becoming highly automated already, but human effort is needed for construction and commissioning as well as maintenance and repair. In developing nations, there is not much automation at all due to labour being so cheap; but this is a great waste of human lives.
These self-repairing systems are based on technologies and knowledge that we already possess. No fictional concepts or unattainable artificial intelligence are required to make this happen. We have the ability today to create systems that provide for the global population's basic needs and far beyond, while minimising our impact on the environment, and these two aspects need not be mutually exclusive.
