Quote:
Originally Posted by calgarygeologist
It would be interesting to know what is driving up costs. Is it some materials component that is the major driver? Labour related? Permitting? Management?
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The issue is not unique to nuclear technology in my opinion. It's that the West
cannot build big things. Just cannot. It's a cultural/skill gap issue that has worsened since the 60's
As for some reasons:
1) incredible corruption (both legal and illegal
https://saportareport.com/another-in...olumnists/tom/) and misalignment of incentives. Why should a construction company receive additional multiples of the original agreement if not completed on time and budget?
2) unique supply chains are uniquely susceptible to irrational price spikes and outages
3) changing technology means despite the promise of replicating past designs, modifications keep getting made and this increases complexity and disruption
4) This might be the most significant: purposefully rosy initial estimates. There is not a soul on the planet who believes any of the original cost estimates of virtually every big project. Why we accept this when backed by government security is beyond me