Based Bent Flyvbjerg on energy is a must read
How big things in energy often do not get done
We’ve previously written extensively on nuclear here:
However, we wanted to spotlight an interesting voice in energy - Bent Flybjerg, a Danish economic geographer and leading scholar on megaprojects, decision-making, and power.
We’re not going to repeat his takes, but will summarise relevant points and sources to explore his content directly.
Small summary
Solar is smart scale-up. It’s modular, fast, and replicable. A solar panel is a basic building block, like a LEGO brick. Put one on a roof, then ten, then ten thousand in a field. Each installation teaches the industry how to do it faster, cheaper, and better. Costs fall year after year.
Nuclear is dumb scale-up. Every plant is a bespoke, one-off project, designed from scratch, built over years or decades, each one different from the last. Nothing repeats. Instead of positive learning, nuclear suffers negative learning: the more you build, the more you discover it is difficult, expensive, and risky. Costs rise, not fall.
Sources
Follow him on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/flyvbjerg/
Follow his medium and read this article https://medium.com/geekculture/what-is-negative-learning-and-how-to-avoid-it-452d9e4c8263
Listen to the Redefining Energy podcast episode with him:
Look at this chart:
