Nuclear Power Plant Building Term

Well, the effects of getting it wrong are specatularly devastating. So time is needed to get it right.

If one is doing something colossal for the very first time, don't be surprised if no-one knows how long it will take and how much it will cost.

Many factors weigh into the length of time. It usually starts with very extensive permitting required to site and approve a plant. Then they are designed and built to much more stringent standards for reliability than other power plants, with multiple redundant systems that are inspected and checked at every stage of the design and construction process. When you don't want to let the radiation out or the reaction progress to a critical level, you have to take extra steps to make sure everything will work properly and that a failure won't cause a catastrophe. It all adds up!