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Construction Physics

Construction Physics
How Washington DC Got Its Metro There have been two main periods of subway (or “metro”) building in the US. The first was during the...
a year ago
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a year ago
There have been two main periods of subway (or “metro”) building in the US. The first was during the late 19th century and early 20th century, when Boston, New York, and Philadelphia all built subway systems
Construction Physics
The Birth of the Grid The day must come when electricity will be for everyone, as the waters of the rivers and the wind of...
a year ago
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a year ago
The day must come when electricity will be for everyone, as the waters of the rivers and the wind of heaven. It should not merely be supplied, but lavished, that men may use it at their will, as the air they breathe. - Emile Zola, “Travail”, 1901
Construction Physics
The Story of Titanium The earth contains a lot of titanium - it’s the ninth most abundant element in the earth’s crust. By...
a year ago
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a year ago
The earth contains a lot of titanium - it’s the ninth most abundant element in the earth’s crust. By mass, there’s more titanium in the earth’s crust than carbon by a factor of nearly 30, and more titanium than copper by a factor of nearly 100. But despite its abundance, it's...
Construction Physics
Will Stone Replace Steel and Concrete? A recent viral tweet by Micah Springut, founder of stone-carving startup Monumental Labs, argued...
9 months ago
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9 months ago
A recent viral tweet by Micah Springut, founder of stone-carving startup Monumental Labs, argued that it will be cheaper to build buildings with stone than with steel or concrete within the next 10 years. Stone has of course been used for thousands of years as a construction...
Construction Physics
How to Build 300,000 Airplanes in Five Years It’s no secret that the Allies won World War II on the back of the U.S.’s enormous industrial...
9 months ago
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9 months ago
It’s no secret that the Allies won World War II on the back of the U.S.’s enormous industrial output. Even before the U.S. entered the war, the Americans provided hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of equipment to the Allies, and between 1938 and 1943 U.S. manufacturing...
Construction Physics
What Progress Has Icon Made on 3D-Printed Homes? We last looked at 3D-printed buildings about three years ago. At the time, the technology was still...
10 months ago
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10 months ago
We last looked at 3D-printed buildings about three years ago. At the time, the technology was still nascent. Although there was a lot of enthusiasm, many efforts were academic, with little commercial deployment, and practitioners were experimenting with a wide range of...
Construction Physics
What Happened to the US Machine Tool Industry? Machine tools – machines that cut or form metal – are the heart of industrial civilization....
a year ago
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a year ago
Machine tools – machines that cut or form metal – are the heart of industrial civilization. Sometimes called “mother machines” (because they’re machines that make other machines), machine tools are required to make almost everything. Nearly every manufactured good is made using...
Construction Physics
A Cycle of Misery: The Business of Building Commercial Aircraft "There are no historic precedents or current parallels for the magnitude of financial exposure...
a year ago
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a year ago
"There are no historic precedents or current parallels for the magnitude of financial exposure risked by an American airframe company" – George Ball, managing director at Lehman Brothers, 1982 "You can't win, you can't break even, and you can't quit" – Jean Pierson, former CEO of...
Construction Physics
Building the Bell System If someone was making a list of the most important American companies today, it’s unlikely AT&T...
7 months ago
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7 months ago
If someone was making a list of the most important American companies today, it’s unlikely AT&T would be anywhere near the top. It’s large, but not notably so: it came in 32nd in the 2024 Fortune 500 ranking, just above Comcast and below Verizon. Its offerings are not unique:...
Construction Physics
How to Build an AI Data Center This piece is the first in a new series from the Institute for Progress (IFP), called Compute in...
8 months ago
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8 months ago
This piece is the first in a new series from the Institute for Progress (IFP), called Compute in America: Building the Next Generation of AI Infrastructure at Home. In this series, we examine the challenges of accelerating the American AI data center buildout. Future pieces will...
Construction Physics
Is Land-Use Regulation Holding Back Construction Productivity? Ed Glaeser is perhaps the pre-eminent urban economist working today, and I’ve cited his work...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Ed Glaeser is perhaps the pre-eminent urban economist working today, and I’ve cited his work repeatedly when looking at land-use restrictions and burdens on new development.
Construction Physics
The Katerra Team Rides Again: ONX Homes Regular readers of Construction Physics know that I formerly worked for the construction startup...
10 months ago
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10 months ago
Regular readers of Construction Physics know that I formerly worked for the construction startup Katerra, which raised several billion dollars in venture capital in the hopes of revolutionizing the construction industry, and then went bankrupt. In fact, it was my experiences at...
Construction Physics
Why the U.S. Can’t Build Icebreaking Ships I want to say thank you to all the people who sent condolences following last week’s post,...
4 months ago
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4 months ago
I want to say thank you to all the people who sent condolences following last week’s post, especially those who shared their own stories of loss.
Construction Physics
The Grid, Part IV: The Hard and Soft Paths of Energy Strategy Today, the electrical grid has over 500,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines and 5 million...
a year ago
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a year ago
Today, the electrical grid has over 500,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines and 5 million miles of lower voltage distribution lines, which supply power from nearly 6,000 large power plants. Together, this system supplies more than 4 trillion kilowatt-hours of electricity...
Construction Physics
The dream of deregulation - the grid part III For most of the industry’s history, electric power in the US had largely been provided by vertically...
a year ago
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a year ago
For most of the industry’s history, electric power in the US had largely been provided by vertically integrated utility companies that handled every part of the electricity supply: generating it, transmitting it, distributing it to customers, and managing the overall system....
Construction Physics
The Long, Sad History of American Attempts to Build High-Speed Rail, Part II Last week, we looked at the early history of high-speed rail in the US. Though the US attempted to...
a year ago
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a year ago
Last week, we looked at the early history of high-speed rail in the US. Though the US attempted to build its own high-speed rail routes soon after they debuted in Japan in 1964, these efforts were unsuccessful, outside of the popular-but-troubled Metroliner
Construction Physics
The Shape of Nuclear Policy Book review: Nuclear Politics: Energy and the State in the United States, Sweden, and France
8 months ago
Construction Physics
Fusion Power Reading List The challenge with reading about a topic like fusion is balancing the tradeoff between technical...
8 months ago
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8 months ago
The challenge with reading about a topic like fusion is balancing the tradeoff between technical detail and readability. A book or article should give enough detail to provide some understanding of what’s actually going on, what progress has been made, what the challenges are,...
Construction Physics
What makes housing so expensive? Buying a home is by far the largest purchase most of us will make, and paying the rent or mortgage...
10 months ago
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10 months ago
Buying a home is by far the largest purchase most of us will make, and paying the rent or mortgage will be our largest monthly expense. In the post-pandemic home-buying boom, the median sale price of a new home peaked at almost $500,000 dollars, just under
Construction Physics
Do U.S. Ports Need More Automation? On October 1st, 47,000 members of the International Longshoremen's Association (ILA), primarily...
4 months ago
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4 months ago
On October 1st, 47,000 members of the International Longshoremen's Association (ILA), primarily dockworkers on East and Gulf Coast ports, went on strike after failing to agree contract terms with USMX, an alliance of port operators and employers.
Construction Physics
Energy Cheat Sheet Building an intuition about energy
2 months ago
Construction Physics
Contribute to the US Megaprojects Database! The US Megaprojects Database Very large construction or technology development projects are...
a year ago
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a year ago
The US Megaprojects Database Very large construction or technology development projects are sometimes called “megaprojects." By directing thousands of workers and billions of dollars towards the achievement of a single goal, great things can be achieved. The output of...
Construction Physics
The Technological Innovations that Produced the Shale Revolution Part One of Hot Rocks: Commercializing Next-Generation Geothermal Energy
a year ago
Construction Physics
What Would It Take to Recreate Bell Labs? For most of the 20th century, AT&T was almost entirely responsible for building and operating...
7 months ago
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7 months ago
For most of the 20th century, AT&T was almost entirely responsible for building and operating America’s telephone infrastructure. It manufactured the phones and electrical equipment, laid hundreds of millions of miles of wire across the country, and built and operated the...
Construction Physics
Will We Ever Get Fusion Power? “Every one of the stars in the sky uses fusion to generate enormous amounts of energy. Why shouldn’t...
8 months ago
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8 months ago
“Every one of the stars in the sky uses fusion to generate enormous amounts of energy. Why shouldn’t we?”
Construction Physics
How I Write Posts I sometimes get asked what my process is for researching and writing Substack posts. I always enjoy...
a year ago
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a year ago
I sometimes get asked what my process is for researching and writing Substack posts. I always enjoy reading other people’s discussions of their writing process, so I thought it would be worthwhile to explain mine. First, some background. In school I was a competent but...
Construction Physics
Airport Reading List The major sources I found helpful for learning about airports and their construction are listed...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
The major sources I found helpful for learning about airports and their construction are listed below. As usual, these are listed roughly in order of how useful I found them. And because “useful” isn’t the same as “actually interesting to read” I’ve marked the books that are...
Construction Physics
What Learning by Doing Looks Like The evolution of polycrystalline diamond drill bits
2 months ago
Construction Physics
Will the China Cycle Come for Airbus and Boeing? Noah Smith, author of the economics Substack Noahpinion, often refers to a common trajectory in...
4 months ago
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4 months ago
Noah Smith, author of the economics Substack Noahpinion, often refers to a common trajectory in Chinese manufacturing as the “China Cycle”:
Construction Physics
Book Review: Healthy Buildings Healthy Buildings, written by John Macomber and Joseph Allen is, as the title suggests, a book about...
a year ago
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a year ago
Healthy Buildings, written by John Macomber and Joseph Allen is, as the title suggests, a book about how buildings affect health. Allen is a former environmental consultant, professor of public health, and director of Harvard’s “Healthy Buildings” program. Macomber is a lecturer...
Construction Physics
The Long Road to Fiber Optics Over the past six decades, advances in computers and microprocessors have completely reshaped our...
5 months ago
Construction Physics
How to Build a 50,000 Ton Forging Press In the late 1940s and early 1950s, a revolution took place in American military aircraft design.
6 months ago
Construction Physics
The grid part II - the golden age of the power industry Welcome to Part II of our history of the electric power industry. For Part I, see here. By 1930, the...
a year ago
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a year ago
Welcome to Part II of our history of the electric power industry. For Part I, see here. By 1930, the US was using 114 trillion kilowatt-hours of electricity a year, generated by more than 4000 power plants. Most electricity was generated by coal (56%) and hydroelectric (34%)...
Construction Physics
Morris Chang and the Origins of TSMC Book review of the autobiography of Morris Chang.
a month ago
Construction Physics
How California Turned Against Growth Even before it became a state, people migrated to California in search of a better life: for jobs,...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Even before it became a state, people migrated to California in search of a better life: for jobs, the chance to become rich and famous, or simply the comfortable climate and beautiful landscape.
Construction Physics
Why Can't the U.S. Build Ships? This post is cross-posted at Noahpinion.
5 months ago
Construction Physics
How China Is Like the 19th Century U.S. I spend a lot of time reading about manufacturing and its evolution, which means I end up repeatedly...
3 months ago
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3 months ago
I spend a lot of time reading about manufacturing and its evolution, which means I end up repeatedly reading about the times and places where radical changes in manufacturing were taking place: Britain in the late 18th century, the US in the late 19th and early 20th centuries,...
Construction Physics
How Good Are American Roads? We’re in an era where US infrastructure is getting a lot of attention.
3 months ago
Construction Physics
Why Levittown Didn't Revolutionize Homebuilding For decades, people have tried to bring mass production methods to housing: to build houses the way...
7 months ago
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7 months ago
For decades, people have tried to bring mass production methods to housing: to build houses the way we build cars. While no one has succeeded, arguably the man that came closest to becoming “the Henry Ford of homebuilding” was William Levitt, with his company Levitt and Sons....
Construction Physics
Born Sleeping A personal post about the loss of our son
5 months ago
Construction Physics
How We Got the Lithium-ion Battery It took decades of research, performed around the world, before a practical lithium-ion battery was...
2 months ago
Construction Physics
Could we stop Yellowstone from erupting with a giant geothermal power plant? It’s become fairly common knowledge that Yellowstone National Park, in addition to being incredibly...
a year ago
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a year ago
It’s become fairly common knowledge that Yellowstone National Park, in addition to being incredibly beautiful, is sitting on top of an enormous supervolcano that catastrophically erupts every few hundred thousand years. Unlike normal volcanoes, which tend to produce large...
Construction Physics
The Influence of Bell Labs We’ve talked previously about Bell Labs’ long, storied history as an innovation engine and a...
3 months ago
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3 months ago
We’ve talked previously about Bell Labs’ long, storied history as an innovation engine and a generator of new technology.
Construction Physics
Could We Boost Housing Construction by Permitting ADUs Under the HUD Code? To boost housing construction, some jurisdictions have adopted a new strategy: allowing the...
a year ago
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a year ago
To boost housing construction, some jurisdictions have adopted a new strategy: allowing the construction of Accessory Dwelling Units, or ADUs. ADUs, sometimes called “granny flats,” are small, secondary housing units built on the lots of existing single family homes – things like...
Construction Physics
Does All Semiconductor Manufacturing Depend on Spruce Pine Quartz? Here’s an idea you see spreading across the internet every so often: that all semiconductor and...
3 months ago
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3 months ago
Here’s an idea you see spreading across the internet every so often: that all semiconductor and solar PV manufacturing depends on extremely pure quartz from the town of Spruce Pine, North Carolina.
Construction Physics
Mass Timber is Great, but It Will Not Solve the Housing Shortage A short policy memo recently posted on the Federation of American Scientists’ (FAS) website argues...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
A short policy memo recently posted on the Federation of American Scientists’ (FAS) website argues that “mass timber can help solve the housing shortage.” It was posted as part of the Housing Ideas Challenge, a collaboration between FAS, Matt Yglesias and a few other...
Construction Physics
Semiconductor fab reading list Like with most types of construction, there's no one source that explains how a semiconductor fab is...
9 months ago
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9 months ago
Like with most types of construction, there's no one source that explains how a semiconductor fab is built and operates. But there's an enormous amount written about semiconductors and the technology used to manufacture them, much of it excellent and informative, which makes it...
Construction Physics
How to Build a $20 Billion Semiconductor Fab For the last several decades, one avenue of technological progress has towered over nearly...
9 months ago
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9 months ago
For the last several decades, one avenue of technological progress has towered over nearly everything else: semiconductors. Semiconductors are materials that can have their conductivity varied by many orders of magnitude, which makes it possible to selectively block and allow the...
Construction Physics
Supersonic air travel recommended reading Aviation has a huge number of enthusiasts, which is why essentially every aircraft model ever...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
Aviation has a huge number of enthusiasts, which is why essentially every aircraft model ever produced has a book written about it. Supersonic aircraft are no exception. There’s a large number of books written about the Concorde, the Tu-144, and the American SST project. Many of...
Construction Physics
The worst US bridges are getting fixed It’s become a common assumption that US infrastructure is in a poor state of repair; that our roads,...
a year ago
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a year ago
It’s become a common assumption that US infrastructure is in a poor state of repair; that our roads, bridges, pipes, and transmission lines are decaying faster than they’re being repaired or replaced. This concern goes back to the early 1980s, when the book "
Construction Physics
Why Did Supersonic Airliners Fail? Progress in aviation has traditionally been associated with speed. Following the Wright Brothers’...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
Progress in aviation has traditionally been associated with speed. Following the Wright Brothers’ flight in 1903, aircraft speeds steadily increased each decade, and increasing aircraft speeds was one of the primary goals of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NASA’s...
Construction Physics
Why Is It So Hard to Build an Airport? Airports are a critical piece of modern infrastructure. Aviation contributes an estimated 8% to...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
Airports are a critical piece of modern infrastructure. Aviation contributes an estimated 8% to global GDP through direct and indirect effects (ie: the businesses and commerce that it enables), and an estimated 25% of companies’ sales rely on air transport. In 2022, civil...
Construction Physics
The blast furnace - 800 years of technology improvement The modern world uses shocking amounts of steel - in the US, we make roughly 575 pounds of steel per...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
The modern world uses shocking amounts of steel - in the US, we make roughly 575 pounds of steel per person per year. At the peak of US steelmaking in the late 1960s, it was closer to 1500 pounds per person, which is roughly how much China makes now.
Construction Physics
Building Apollo A review of Angle of Attack: Harrison Storms and the Race to the Moon
a year ago
Construction Physics
Could ChatGPT become an architect? OpenAI recently released an updated version of their GPT large language model, GPT-4, and have...
a year ago
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a year ago
OpenAI recently released an updated version of their GPT large language model, GPT-4, and have incorporated it into their ChatGPT chatbot. In case you've been living under a rock, ChatGPT is a chatbot that uses large language models, which use artificial neural networks
Construction Physics
Boeing Reading List Unlike most topics that I write about, the aircraft industry is an industry that has enthusiasts:...
a year ago
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a year ago
Unlike most topics that I write about, the aircraft industry is an industry that has enthusiasts: lots and lots of people are interested in following various aspects of the commercial aircraft world for fun (example: not only are there extremely accurate flight simulators, but...
Construction Physics
Why Skyscrapers Became Glass Boxes Everything put into the building that is unnecessary, every cubic foot that is used for purely...
a month ago
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a month ago
Everything put into the building that is unnecessary, every cubic foot that is used for purely ornamental purposes beyond that needed to express its use and to make it harmonize with others of its class, is a waste — is, to put it in plain English, perverting someone’s money —...
Construction Physics
On Klein on Construction In the New York Times, Ezra Klein investigated the recent Goolsbee and Syverson paper on...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
In the New York Times, Ezra Klein investigated the recent Goolsbee and Syverson paper on construction productivity we recently looked at. Klein suggests that the stagnation in construction productivity might be the result of organized special interests increasingly leveraging...
Construction Physics
The Evolution of Tunnel Boring Machines Tunneling is an important technology for modern civilization, as a tunnel is often the only...
a year ago
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a year ago
Tunneling is an important technology for modern civilization, as a tunnel is often the only reasonable way to create a direct path between two points. When the Hoosac tunnel was completed in 1875, it turned a difficult, 20-mile railroad route along “
Construction Physics
How the Gas Turbine Conquered the Electric Power Industry A prophecy expressed frequently in engineering circles at the present day is that turbines actuated...
a year ago
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a year ago
A prophecy expressed frequently in engineering circles at the present day is that turbines actuated by hot gases, other than steam, will eventually come to the front as prime movers. — A Scientific Investigation Into the Possibilities of Gas-Turbines,
Construction Physics
Roman vs Modern Concrete There's a new paper out exploring some of the chemical mechanisms at work in Roman concrete. As per...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
There's a new paper out exploring some of the chemical mechanisms at work in Roman concrete. As per usual, it’s triggered a round of enthusiastic discussion of Roman concrete, and how its ability to last for millennia puts modern concrete (which often fails after a few decades)...
Construction Physics
Construction Productivity - Structural Steel This week we’re continuing our investigation of productivity trends in US construction. We...
a year ago
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a year ago
This week we’re continuing our investigation of productivity trends in US construction. We previously looked at single family home construction, and noted that the number of hours required to construct 100 square feet of single family home has slightly increased over the past 50...
Construction Physics
Which city builds skyscrapers the fastest? Last week we looked at trends in skyscraper construction speed for New York and Chicago, finding...
a year ago
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a year ago
Last week we looked at trends in skyscraper construction speed for New York and Chicago, finding that New York has gotten significantly slower at building skyscrapers over time. Chicago, on the other hand, has declined in speed less steadily, and currently builds skyscrapers much...
Construction Physics
How did solar power get cheap part II (note: all quotes are from Nemet’s How Solar Energy Became Cheap unless otherwise noted.) Welcome to...
a year ago
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a year ago
(note: all quotes are from Nemet’s How Solar Energy Became Cheap unless otherwise noted.) Welcome to Part II of “How did Solar Power Get Cheap?” To recap Part I, the modern solar photovoltaic (PV) cell was invented at Bell Labs in 1954. Early markets were almost entirely...
Construction Physics
How did solar power get cheap? Part I Solar photovoltaics (PV) have become one of the cheapest sources of electricity. Lazard’s estimate...
a year ago
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a year ago
Solar photovoltaics (PV) have become one of the cheapest sources of electricity. Lazard’s estimate of unsubsidized levelized cost of energy (LCOE)
Construction Physics
On Yglesias on Manufactured Homes A few weeks ago, Matt Yglesias wrote “How to Unleash a Trailer Home Boom," which outlines a strategy...
a year ago
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a year ago
A few weeks ago, Matt Yglesias wrote “How to Unleash a Trailer Home Boom," which outlines a strategy for getting more manufactured homes built. Broadly, Yglesias proposes ending HUD code requirements that manufactured homes have a steel chassis, making it easier and less...
Construction Physics
When did New York start building slowly? (Note: the analysis below of floor plate size vs construction speed is incorrect due to...
a year ago
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a year ago
(Note: the analysis below of floor plate size vs construction speed is incorrect due to autocorrelation effects. For a correct analysis, see the subsequent post here) It’s good to be able to build things quickly. The faster you build something, the quicker the benefits from it...
Construction Physics
Does construction ever get cheaper? I've mentioned a few times that I generally prefer looking at construction progress through the lens...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
I've mentioned a few times that I generally prefer looking at construction progress through the lens of cost indexes rather than productivity indexes. Whereas productivity indexes try to track changes in the amount of construction we get for a given amount of labor (for labor...
Construction Physics
How much safer has construction gotten? When talking about (the lack of) construction productivity growth, or the fact that we used to build...
a year ago
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a year ago
When talking about (the lack of) construction productivity growth, or the fact that we used to build things much faster than we do today, commentators frequently mention the safety of the construction workers. On this view, construction speed/efficiency and worker risk are a...
Construction Physics
Building Fast and Slow: The Empire State Building and the World Trade Center (Part I) The Empire State Building was completed in 1931. At a height of 1250 feet [0], it was the world's...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
The Empire State Building was completed in 1931. At a height of 1250 feet [0], it was the world's tallest building, exceeding the recently completed Chrysler building by 202 feet. It would hold that title for the next 39 years, until 1970 when it was surpassed in height by...
Construction Physics
Weekend roundup - Icon, Diamond Age, Cuby, Gropyus Since there’s more interesting things happening in construction than I can cover in a weekly post...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
Since there’s more interesting things happening in construction than I can cover in a weekly post (especially if I’m spending posts writing about things that happened 800 years ago), I’m experimenting with occasionally sending out a brief roundup of interesting links related to...
Construction Physics
The Rise and Fall of the Mail-Order Home In the early 20th century, a new business model appeared: the mail-order home. Companies would mail...
a year ago
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a year ago
In the early 20th century, a new business model appeared: the mail-order home. Companies would mail out catalogs containing several dozen different home options, buyers would send in their orders, and the company would send the necessary materials – pre-cut lumber, roofing,...
Construction Physics
Building Fast and Slow Part II - The World Trade Center Part II in our series comparing the construction of two Tallest Building in the World projects - the...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
Part II in our series comparing the construction of two Tallest Building in the World projects - the Empire State Building and the World Trade Center. See here for Part I. Unless otherwise noted, information and quotes are from “City in the Sky: The Rise and Fall of the World...
Construction Physics
Why Is Homeowners Insurance Getting So Expensive? The recent Los Angeles fires have highlighted the rising costs of homeowners insurance in the US.
a month ago
Construction Physics
“No inventions; no innovations” A History of US Steel Last week US Steel announced it was being acquired by Japanese steel company Nippon Steel. The...
a year ago
25
a year ago
Last week US Steel announced it was being acquired by Japanese steel company Nippon Steel. The milestone gives an opportunity to look back at what once was the largest and most important company in the US (and arguably the world), and how it slowly declined. Prior to the...
Construction Physics
The Rise of Steel - Part I One of the defining characteristics of the modern world is the ubiquity of steel. Nearly every...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
One of the defining characteristics of the modern world is the ubiquity of steel. Nearly every product of industrial civilization relies on steel, either as a component or as part of the equipment used to produce it. Without it, Vaclav Smil notes in “Still the Iron Age”, modern...
Construction Physics
The Rise of Steel Part II Welcome to the Rise of Steel part II. We previously looked at the early stages of industrialization...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
Welcome to the Rise of Steel part II. We previously looked at the early stages of industrialization of iron and steelmaking, between roughly 1200 and 1850. To briefly recap, making steel was an involved, multistep process. Iron would first be smelted from iron ore in a blast...
Construction Physics
Goolsbee and Syverson on Construction Productivity Several people have asked me about a new NBER working paper that takes a look at construction...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
Several people have asked me about a new NBER working paper that takes a look at construction productivity (a popular topic around here), “The Strange and Awful Path of Productivity in the US Construction Sector,” by Austan Goolsbee and Chad Syverson. This paper doesn’t bring any...
Construction Physics
Building Fast and Slow Part IV: Construction of the World Trade Center This is Part IV in a series comparing the construction of the Empire State Building and the World...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
This is Part IV in a series comparing the construction of the Empire State Building and the World Trade Center. Part I covers the design and construction of the Empire State Building, Part II covers the initial development of the World Trade Center, and Part III covers the
Construction Physics
Building Fast and Slow Part III: Design of the World Trade Center This is Part III in a series comparing the construction of the Empire State Building and the World...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
This is Part III in a series comparing the construction of the Empire State Building and the World Trade Center. Part I covers the design and construction of the Empire State Building, and Part II covers the initial development of the World Trade Center
Construction Physics
How Fast Can a City Grow? In the last post, we noted Los Angeles was the fastest-growing city in the US at the end of the 19th...
a year ago
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a year ago
In the last post, we noted Los Angeles was the fastest-growing city in the US at the end of the 19th century, growing nearly 10% yearly between 1880 and 1930. This made me wonder what the landscape of city growth rates looks like. How fast were other US cities growing at the same...
Construction Physics
How Valuable Are Building Methods That Use Fewer Materials? Materials make up a substantial fraction of the costs of new construction. When we previously looked...
a year ago
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a year ago
Materials make up a substantial fraction of the costs of new construction. When we previously looked at a collection of 40 different construction tasks, on average materials made up 62% of the cost of the task. And for an average new house, materials make up roughly 50% of direct...
Construction Physics
Which Construction Tasks Have Gotten Cheaper? We spend a lot of time around here looking at construction costs, and whenever we do the same story...
a year ago
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a year ago
We spend a lot of time around here looking at construction costs, and whenever we do the same story emerges: construction never gets cheaper. Construction costs tend to rise at or above the level of overall inflation. A square foot of building costs as much or more to build today...
Construction Physics
Machine Tool Reading List For those interested in reading more about the machine tool industry, the sources I found useful are...
a year ago
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a year ago
For those interested in reading more about the machine tool industry, the sources I found useful are listed below. The machine tool industry has been studied quite extensively, if sporadically (lots of sources talk about its decline in the 1980s, fewer ones talk about its...
Construction Physics
What Progress Has There Been In Industrial Robots? Long-term, I’m optimistic about robots and automation solving construction’s stagnant cost and...
a year ago
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a year ago
Long-term, I’m optimistic about robots and automation solving construction’s stagnant cost and productivity problem. Even if nothing else works, if you can build a cheap machine capable of doing everything a human can do, that would greatly reduce labor costs, which are a large...
Construction Physics
How the Car Came to LA Since at least the 1960s, urbanists have bemoaned the car-centric nature of US transportation. In...
a year ago
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a year ago
Since at least the 1960s, urbanists have bemoaned the car-centric nature of US transportation. In her 1961 “The Death and Life of Great American Cities," Jane Jacobs notes that “everyone who values cities is disturbed by automobiles”: Traffic arteries, along with parking lots,...
Construction Physics
Why do we need infrastructure policy? My title at IFP is "Senior Infrastructure Fellow," which means that in addition to publishing this...
a year ago
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a year ago
My title at IFP is "Senior Infrastructure Fellow," which means that in addition to publishing this newsletter, I do work related to infrastructure policy. At a high level, that work is figuring out which things we should be building, and how we can make building those things...
Construction Physics
Inside the interconnection queue Electric power in the US is provided by the electrical grid, a huge network of power plants,...
2 weeks ago
14
2 weeks ago
Electric power in the US is provided by the electrical grid, a huge network of power plants, transmission lines, and transformers that moves electric power from where it's generated to where it's consumed.
Construction Physics
We Need More Research on how CO2 Affects Cognition A growing body of research indicates there are potentially large health benefits to improving indoor...
a year ago
14
a year ago
A growing body of research indicates there are potentially large health benefits to improving indoor air quality. Indoor spaces are often poorly ventilated and expose occupants to high levels of contaminants, such as pathogens, particulates, and other pollutants. Because people...
Construction Physics
How Will the Trump Tariffs Affect Construction? Earlier this month the Trump administration announced hefty 25% tariffs on Canadian and Mexican...
a week ago
13
a week ago
Earlier this month the Trump administration announced hefty 25% tariffs on Canadian and Mexican imports, along with an additional 10% tariffs on Chinese imports.
Construction Physics
The Long, Sad History of American Attempts to Build High-Speed Rail, Part I California has received its fair share of criticism for the trajectory of its high-speed rail...
a year ago
12
a year ago
California has received its fair share of criticism for the trajectory of its high-speed rail project. When voters first approved the $10 billion dollar bond issue for the project in 2008, it was projected to be completed by 2020 at a cost of $33 billion. Instead, its costs have
Construction Physics
Welding and the Automation Frontier The big question about Artificial Intelligence, other than whether it will destroy human...
a year ago
11
a year ago
The big question about Artificial Intelligence, other than whether it will destroy human civilization, is the effect it will have on employment. Large language models already seem poised to automate large fractions of the work in certain industries, and the technology is only...
Construction Physics
Reading list 02/22/25 Waymo’s factory, a map of US land values, ships in the Arctic Circle, battery industry trends, and...
6 hours ago
4
6 hours ago
Waymo’s factory, a map of US land values, ships in the Arctic Circle, battery industry trends, and more.