Complexity And Sustainability In Megaprojects

This book showcases the discussion about megaprojects carried out at the MeRIT (Megaproject Research Interdisciplinary Team) workshop 2022: the crisis, discontinuity, rising prices, and supply chains disruption force radical reflection for those involved in megaprojects. It raises a modern-day challenge, the creation of value for stakeholders. Indeed, the aim of the volume is to encourage readers to think more broadly, articulately and less stringently than the mainstream claims. There is a need to design, implement, and manage megaprojects by abandoning the old paradigm that leveraged solely on time and cost. We need to move beyond that by going to explore the value generated, the positive impact on people, communities and territories. Economic, social and environmental sustainability takes on a new and broader articulation: issues of the circular economy applied to megaprojects are addressed and ample space is ensured for the inclusion of social needs in current practices.

This book showcases the discussion about megaprojects carried out at the MeRIT (Megaproject Research Interdisciplinary Team) workshop 2023: the crisis, discontinuity, rising prices, and supply chains disruption force radical reflection for those involved in megaprojects. It raises a modern-day challenge, the creation of value for stakeholders. Indeed, the aim of the volume is to encourage readers to think more broadly, articulately and less stringently than the mainstream claims. There is a need to design, implement, and manage megaprojects by abandoning the old paradigm that leveraged solely on time and cost. We need to move beyond that by going to explore the value generated, the positive impact on people, communities and territories. Economic, social and environmental sustainability takes on a new and broader articulation: issues of the circular economy applied to megaprojects are addressed and ample space is ensured for the inclusion of social needs in current practices.

The book investigates the various aspects characterizing Megaprojects from numerous perspectives and by integrating different disciplines: engineering, economics, business organization, human resource management, law, etc. It represents the first output of MeRIT (the Megaproject Research Interdisciplinary Team), and focuses on the intrinsic and unavoidable complexity of Megaprojects. The chapters have intentionally not been standardized, and humanistic topics are not separated from technical ones: this way of reading and interpreting Megaprojects through the cross-pollination of various disciplines reflects the MeRIT approach. Addressing the complexity involved in Megaprojects requires the use of a hermeneutic circle of sorts: understanding the project as a whole is achieved by referring to the specific parts, while each part can only be understood in relation to the whole. This circular approach appears to be the only one applicable to Megaprojects: no final destination, no final synthesis can be achieved. This volume consists of eight chapters written by researchers in law, economics, sociology, business organization, engineering, architecture and landscaping. The topics covered will be relevant to researchers, practitioners involved in the development of Megaprojects, and policymakers at the EU level.

This book analyses the seminal role of megaprojects for sustainable development, and the related, complex challenges they bring. It provides insights into the growing social responsibilities that megaprojects have, not only to be environmentally sustainable, but also towards the multitude of stakeholders involved, whether directly or indirectly. After an historical overview of the increasingly necessary links between sustainable infrastructure and megaprojects, the book builds on and applies stakeholder theory to stakeholder engagement and management in megaprojects. It also emphasizes the importance of building impact assessment frameworks that consider the unheard voices that are often passively sitting at the receiving end of a megaproject, as well as the local context where the megaproject is embedded. The book then proceeds to analyse the case of a very contested transnational railway megaproject between Italy and France, the Turin-Lyon high-speed railway, which has been suffering from stakeholder and communication issues for over thirty years, as well as from notable managerial and legal differences in the two countries. In this way, the book informs both theory and practice and encourages scholarly interventions into wicked problems. It contains a comprehensive review of the academic literature on the sustainability, sustainability challenges, and sustainability reporting of megaprojects. Conceptual models, frameworks and future research opportunities are provided to clarify the empirical challenges and highlight the gaps and opportunities to be explored by researchers and practitioners in future. The audience for the book is both academic researchers and practitioners in the field of megaprojects and more specifically, those dealing with managing transnational megaprojects. It also includes several topics that will be of interest to policy and decision-makers.

Megaprojects, also referred to in the literature as Large Engineering Projects or Major Projects, are generally defined as large-scale investment initiatives worth 1b€/$ or more and, facing similar problems independent of the country where they are implemented and the industry they belong to. The common feature of most megaprojects is that they are difficult to design and manage so that their realization and completion is always extremely expensive, often over budget and delivery deadlines also are not met. In the worst-case scenario, they remain unfinished. This book, through its multidisciplinary approach, offers food for thought and alternative interpretations for the complex world of megaprojects. While much research has been conducted and differing approaches have been developed over the last 20 years, there is still a lot of debate surrounding the topic, and a holistic approach for effectively managing these initiatives is still missing. What is clear to all researchers and experts in the field is that a traditional-linear management approach is simply not sufficient, as at many stages of a megaproject, iterative and feedback effect occurs due to stakeholder involvement and increasing and continuous interaction between them. The book promotes the debate among all categories of stakeholders involved in the megaproject’s supply chain, in order to increase the awareness of complex phenomena relating to the critical issues and common problems they face, all over the world, and to seek performance improvement across the whole life cycle of a megaproject, including the selection, design, construction, operation and de- commissioning.The multidisciplinary approach cultivated in the book conveys an innovative way to study megaprojects and their inherent complexities.

This book analyses the seminal role of megaprojects for sustainable development, and the related, complex challenges they bring. It provides insights into the growing social responsibilities that megaprojects have, not only to be environmentally sustainable, but also towards the multitude of stakeholders involved, whether directly or indirectly. After an historical overview of the increasingly necessary links between sustainable infrastructure and megaprojects, the book builds on and applies stakeholder theory to stakeholder engagement and management in megaprojects. It also emphasizes the importance of building impact assessment frameworks that consider the unheard voices that are often passively sitting at the receiving end of a megaproject, as well as the local context where the megaproject is embedded. The book then proceeds to analyse the case of a very contested transnational railway megaproject between Italy and France, the Turin-Lyon high-speed railway, which has been suffering from stakeholder and communication issues for over thirty years, as well as from notable managerial and legal differences in the two countries. In this way, the book informs both theory and practice and encourages scholarly interventions into wicked problems. It contains a comprehensive review of the academic literature on the sustainability, sustainability challenges, and sustainability reporting of megaprojects. Conceptual models, frameworks and future research opportunities are provided to clarify the empirical challenges and highlight the gaps and opportunities to be explored by researchers and practitioners in future. The audience for the book is both academic researchers and practitioners in the field of megaprojects and more specifically, those dealing with managing transnational megaprojects. It also includes several topics that will be of interest to policy and decision-makers.

This handbook provides state-of-the-art scholarship in the emerging field of megaproject management. The 25 chapters cover all aspects of megaproject management, from front-end planning to actual project delivery, including how to deal with stakeholders, risk, finance, complexity, innovation, governance, ethics, project breakdowns, and scale itself.

Avoid common pitfalls in large-scale projects using these smart strategies Over half of large-scale engineering and construction projects—off-shore oil platforms, chemical plants, metals processing, dams, and similar projects—have miserably poor results. These include billions of dollars in overruns, long delays in design and construction, and poor operability once finally completed. Industrial Megaprojects gives you a clear, nontechnical understanding of why these major projects get into trouble, and how your company can prevent hazardous and costly errors when undertaking such large technical and management challenges. Clearly explains the underlying causes of over-budget, delayed, and unsafe megaprojects Examines effects of poor project management, destructive team behaviors, weak accountability systems, short-term focus, and lack of investment in technical expertise Author is the CEO of the leading consulting firm for evaluating billion-dollar projects Companies worldwide are rethinking their large-scale projects. Industrial Megaprojects is your essential guide for this rethink, offering the tools and principles that are the true foundation of safe, cost-effective, successful megaprojects.