List of mega-projects

ProjectTypeSelected citation(s)
ITERGrand ProjetClaessens, 2018, ITER, étoile de la science : petite histoire d’un projet scientifique titanesque (see also book review by Vincent Simoulin, 2019, in: Revue d’anthropologie des connaissances)
ELIBig ScienceAnon., 2012, Light in the east, in: Nature Physics; Abbott, 2019, World’s largest laser lab rocked by slew of disputes, in: Nature
SEEIIST*Big ScienceAmaldi, et al., South East European International Institute for Sustainable Technologies (SEEIIST), in: Frontiers in Physics
CSNS†Big ScienceWei, et al., 2010, China Spallation Neutron Source – An overview of application prospects, in: Chinese Physics C; Qiu, 2016, Building national laboratories to meet China’s development challenges, in: National Science Review; Engel-Cox, 2014, Creating the National Renewable Energy Laboratory: Implications for New National Energy Research Institutes (US Department of Energy)
African Light Source*Big ScienceConnell, et al., 2019, Towards an African Light Source, in: Biophysical Reviews
Grand Inga Dam*Grand ProjetShowers, 2011, Beyond Mega on a Mega Continent: Grand Inga on Central Africa’s Congo River, in: Engineering Earth
Science and expertise in large “agro-industrial complexes”††?Khodakivska, 2019, Die Nationalen Akademie der
Agrarwissenschaften der Ukraine – Struktur, Aufgaben und Reform (Deutsch-Ukrainischer Agrarpolitischer Dialog); Balman and Schaft, 2020, Perspektiven der Agrarforschung in der Ukraine – eine Reflexion am Beispiel der Nationalen Akademie der Agrarwissenschaften (Ukraine-Analysen)
Innovation and re-equipment in the petrochemical industry††?Mellsted and Pallua, 2018, The Historical Transition from Coal to Hydrocarbons: Previous Explanations and the Need for an Integrative Perspective, in: Canadian Journal of History
Fossil fuel extraction and mines††?Calkins, 2016, How “clean gold” came to matter: metal detectors, infrastructure, and valuation, in: HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory; Kolb, 2013, The Natural Gas Revolution: At the Pivot of the World’s Energy Future
Architecture of factories and laboratories††?Zhang, et al., 2023, Spatial logic of scientific research: an exploratory and quantitative analysis of 42 scientific research buildings sited in America and Europe, in: Architectural Engineering and Design Management; Aitchison (ed.), 2014, The Architecture of Industry: Changing Paradigms in Industrial Building and Planning
*Proposal stage only, i.e., no concrete has been poured (yet). †One example of a Chinese program of laboratory construction seemingly driven in part by anxiety about a lack of big national labs in China on the scale of the US Department of Energy; chosen as example of developments in the industrially-important Pearl River Delta. ††Currently I have not developed these themes but would hope to do so in future, looking for analysis in the specific area of science and expertise in these sites of production with contemporary examples (historical examples would not be excluded but the threshold would be high for inclusion). Sources include IAEA Accelerator Knowledge Portal. The table will be curated gradually over time and therefore is likely to change substantially.

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