Van de Graaf, Thijs and Sovacool, Benjamin K (2014) Thinking big: politics, progress, and security in the management of Asian and European energy megaprojects. Energy Policy, 74. pp. 16-27. ISSN 0301-4215

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Abstract

This article examines four energy megaprojects, two in Europe and two in Asia. For each region, a large natural gas pipeline project and an international project involving solar power from the desert is studied. The natural gas projects are: the Nabucco project (in Europe) and the trans-ASEAN gas pipeline network (in Asia). The solar power from the desert projects are: Desertec (in Europe) and Gobitec (in Asia). The article probes explanations of megaproject failure along social, technical, economic, political, and psychological dimensions. We find that these projects, though they are very different in nature and pertain to different regions, all suffer from a similar set of problems: too many stakeholders and stakeholder fragmentation; cost overruns and the risk of accidents and attacks; massive externalization of costs to third party stakeholders; concentration of wealth and corruption; and inflated expectations and biased projections. We conclude by reflecting on lessons for not only the involved institutions and investors, but energy analysts and the public at large.

Item Type:	Article
Schools and Departments:	School of Business, Management and Economics > SPRU - Science Policy Research Unit
Depositing User:	Benjamin Sovacool
Date Deposited:	20 Jan 2016 10:46
Last Modified:	03 Jun 2016 10:56
URI:	http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/58403

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