Abstract :
YOU KNOW that an engineering project will be big when the surveys carried out to determine its viability alone come with a $900 million price tag. That is how much Morten Nygart, CEO of Danish consultancy firm Global 2020, estimates the Chinese firm tasked with getting the job done has spent so far on feasibility and environmental impact studies that stack up over a metre high. Global 2020 is advising European companies looking to participate in the megaproject. Boldly dubbed by the Nicaraguan government ´the biggest engineering project in human history´, it calls for the design, development and operation of a second interoceanic canal in a Central American country.