Spending for health care

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by sugarpop

I recently heard something on PBR about a nuclear power plant that was supposed to be built. Initially, the cost was, like, 300 million or something (I don't remember exactly). Now the cost has more than tripled. WTF? How exactly does that happen?

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

While they may have had no problem padding the cost, there's a good chance that they also woefully underbid the project in the first place.

Nukes take many years to get from "lets build it", to bring it on line. During the entire process the regulatory powers are constantly changing the rules. Even after the final plan has all the necessary approvals and construction begins, they keep changing the rules, in many cases requiring the contractor to rip out work completed to accommodate those changes or redesign things that hook to the changes.

This has been the rule, with no exceptions, since they've been building them.

France has been successful with nukes by standardizing one design and let them build as many as they wanted, all alike. That way you know what you're building and how much it will cost, up front.