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Verkanntes unternehmerisches Risiko
Der übereilte Einstieg der schweizerischen Elektrizitätswirtschaft in die Atomtechnologie: der Fall Motor-Columbus 1961-1966.

Autor: Patrick Kupper
Jahr: 2002, Heftnummer: 1, Seite(n): 48-71

Until the early 1960s the Swiss electricity supply economy was used to construct almost exclusively hydroelectric power plants. In these years it started serious attempts to diversify its facilities. After considering the construction of several thermal power plants, fired with coal or oil, the companies quite soon gave up those projects and started to plan nuclear power plants. Historical accounts so far have mainly attributed this double shift, from water to coal/oil to atom, to changes in the macroeconomic environment on the one hand and to the political pressure exerted by the Swiss government on the other hand. Analysing the mentioned shift from the perspective of one of the involved enterprises, the engineering firm Motor-Columbus, the paper presents new findings, which differ significantly from these previous judgements. One main finding is that the abandonment of thermal power plants in favour of nuclear power plants was strongly affected by two factors: First, by the local action-groups opposing the projects, and second, by the entrepreneurs’ visions of the further development of nuclear technology. These visions on its part were biased by a collective misperception of business risk.