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A comment on First new US nuclear reactor in decades enters commercial operation in Georgia. Parent comment

Re:First new US nuclear reactor in decades enters commercial... by FrustratedMonky on Monday July 31, 2023 @04:43PM (#36948506)
>“seven years late and $17 billion over budget. At its full output of 1,100 megawatts of electricity”

It's all projects. This just happens to be a big one.

Everyone likes to point to over-runs, over-budget, late projects.

Nobody goes back and asks "who did the original estimate that we eventually went over?".

Many projects start with /s 'everyone knowing it will go over budget, but if we give a real estimate it wont get off the ground'/s.

Then later someone has to get blamed. If everyone is (quietly)honest they kind of spread around the blame and the success. If it is a contentious project, everyone is playing tag at the end.

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Re:First new US nuclear reactor in decades enters commercial... by bryanlarsen on Monday July 31, 2023 @04:50PM (#36948609)
Every other kind of power project is built using fixed price bids. If a company bids $3B for a natural gas plant or solar plant and the project costs more than $3B to build the company is on the hook, not the ratepayer.
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Re:First new US nuclear reactor in decades enters commercial... by FrustratedMonky on Monday July 31, 2023 @04:59PM (#36948736)
I didn't dig into details on specific of this project.

But any large fixed price project I've been on, it all hinged on verbose specifications. And then any change resulted in change orders. And it becomes a pissing match of who will pay. It is rarely cut and dry.

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Re:First new US nuclear reactor in decades enters commercial... by bryanlarsen on Monday July 31, 2023 @05:09PM (#36948858)
They are power contracts, not construction contracts. The power company isn't buying a power plant, they're buying power. That's what makes the contract so much simpler.
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Re:First new US nuclear reactor in decades enters commercial... by FrustratedMonky on Monday July 31, 2023 @07:10PM (#36950134)
I'll have to pass. I don't know the power industry that well.

My rule of thumb thought, is that nobody looses 17 billion. That gets passed to the consumer somewhere somehow. In someway obviously or not obviously.

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