Transformer steel manufacturing, textile engineering, bringing power plants online quickly, infrasound, and more. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

Not long ago we looked at construction productivity trends for the US and for countries around the world. We found that in the U.S., and in most other large, wealthy countries, construction productivity is stagnant or declining. Unlike manufacturing and agriculture, or the economy overall, which generally show improving productivity over time, in the field of construction we find that productivity tends to at best stay constant, and at worst decline over time. Captured by scrape-rss from…

A quadruped welding robot, the China Shock 2.0, transformer startups, China’s mysteriously moving satellites, and more. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

Is the Strait of Hormuz open yet, building code cost benefit analysis, Intel joining Terafab, sponge cities, and more. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

The war in Iran, and the subsequent closure of the Strait of Hormuz, has unfortunately made us all familiar with details of the petroleum supply chain that we could formerly happily ignore. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

Aluminum disruptions, the EV rust belt, the ongoing transformer shortage, SpaceX’s IPO, and more Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

I spend a lot of time reading about the nature of technological progress, and I’ve found that the literature on technology is somewhat uneven. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

Plastic price jumps, crypto-backed mortgages, a proposed AI data center pause, US battery manufacturing, and more. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

As we’ve noted more than a few times before, for most of the 20th century AT&T’s Bell Labs was the premier industrial research lab in the US. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

Damage to the Ras Laffan LNG facility, housing bubble risks, North Korea’s naval production, Bezos’ $100 billion for manufacturing automation, and more. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

Every day there’s some new story about the enormous amounts of investment in building AI data centers. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

Closure of the Strait of Hormuz, banning build-to-rent homes in the US, Honda’s EV losses, Travis Kalanick’s new company, Corpus Christi’s water crisis, and more. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

It’s long been believed the constantly rising costs of new home construction, and lackluster improvements in construction productivity more generally, are fundamentally a problem of production methods. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

Data centers disconnecting from the grid, solar PV efficiency records, repairs for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, Ford’s EV missteps, former OpenAI CTO’s new startup. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

Many who look at the high and rising cost of housing see the problem as fundamentally one of production methods; more specifically, that homes could be built more cheaply if they were made using factories and industrialized processes, instead of assembling them on site using manual labor and hand-held tools. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

LA permitting costs, trickle-down housing, Panasonic stops making TVs, robotaxi remote operators, geothermal progress. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

Welcome to the reading list, a weekly roundup of news and links related to buildings, infrastructure, and industrial technology. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

A theme running through my book is the idea that efficiency improvements, and the various methods for making products cheaper over time, have historically been dependent on some degree of repetition, on running your production process over and over again. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

Welcome to the reading list, a weekly list of news and links related to buildings, infrastructure, and industrial technology. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed

(This is a chapter of a longer report I’m working on that summarizes and expands the last several years of my work on construction productivity. Captured by scrape-rss from https://www.construction-physics.com/feed