OPTIMISM AND PESSIMISM IN NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY PROMISES: THE LEGACIES OF THREE EUROPEAN EPR PROJECTS

Abstract

Megaprojects in different sectors, including nuclear energy, often suffer from a range of “pathologies” such as significant delays, budget overruns, and failure to deliver on their promises. Drawing on the concept of techno-scientific promising and on the controversy among megaproject scholars over the “Hiding Hand” principle, this article questions the notion of overoptimism as the primary cause of problems with nuclear-sector megaprojects. It examines the Generation III European Pressurised Reactor (EPR) as an example of the complex roles of optimism and pessimism in megaproject governance and the construction of techno-scientific promises, focusing on the early justification and planning phases of the projects. The conclusions underline the necessity and risks of optimism and the difficulty of judging – ex ante – whether optimism and pessimism produce societally desirable impacts in view of the wider long-term impacts of megaprojects. It also highlights the need for institutionalised forms of pessimism in order to keep overoptimism in check and ensure the societal robustness of techno-scientific promises. The long legacies of promise cycles in the nuclear sector have far-reaching consequences for the current-day promise-construction. This is demonstrated by the promise of newer small modular reactors which has emerged partly in reaction to the formidable difficulties of the Generation III projects. These difficulties have, in turn, been shaped by earlier dynamics of optimism and pessimism for EPR in Europe.