Reading List 04/25/26
Transformer steel manufacturing, textile engineering, bringing power plants online quickly, infrasound, and more.
Welcome to the reading list, a list of news and links related to buildings, infrastructure, and industrial technology. This week we look at transformer steel manufacturing, textile engineering, bringing power plants online quickly, infrasound, and more. Roughly 2/3rds of the reading list is paywalled, so for full access become a paid subscriber.
War in Iran
This week in Strait of Hormuz supply chain issues: a shortage of battery ingredients [Heatmap], the world’s top condom producer plans to raise prices by 20-30% due to petrochemical supply disruption [X], and Lufthansa plans to cut 20,000 flights due to rising jet fuel costs. [UPI]
And it seems like the closure might not be resolved any time soon. It could apparently take up to 6 months to clear the Strait of Hormuz of mines. [Washington Post]
Housing
The Economist on SB-79, and other efforts to stimulate the production of housing in California. “SB 79 rezones state land around busy public-transport stops to allow for taller residential buildings. It also slaps hefty fines on cities that try to deny such buildings a permit. It was amended more than a dozen times to appease rural lawmakers, unions and tenants-rights groups—and it still barely passed the legislature. The bill spent weeks on the governor’s desk, which gave his pro-housing allies the willies and Mr Pratt some hope. But on October 10th Mr Newsom signed the law and delivered a huge win to the ascendant YIMBY (Yes In My Backyard) movement. The passage of SB 79 and more than 40 other housing reforms this year could be a turning point for a state that is crippled by its self-inflicted housing shortage.” [Economist]
Manufacturing
A good Substack post on transformers and why their various components – such as grain oriented electrical steel — are difficult to make. “Producing [GOES] is one of the most demanding metallurgical processes in heavy industry. The slab has to be reheated above 1,350 degrees Celsius to dissolve precipitate inhibitors that later pin grain boundaries, then cold-rolled to the final gauge, and finally decarburized in wet hydrogen to bring the carbon content below 0.003 percent. The entire coil goes into a high-temperature box anneal at 1,200 degrees Celsius for five to seven days, and during that week inside the furnace, through a phenomenon called abnormal grain growth, Goss-oriented grains consume the rest of the matrix and grow to centimeters across a sheet that is barely thicker than a credit card. Premium grades are then laser-scribed in transverse lines to refine the magnetic domains and cut losses by a further ten to fifteen percent. Each step is unforgiving, and a single deviation in composition, atmosphere, or timing ruins the whole coil.” [Frontier Map]
Also on the subject of steel, Did low-quality steel contribute to the sinking of the Titanic? “The steel used in constructing the RMS Titanic was probably the best plain carbon ship plate available in the period of 1909 to 1911, but it would not be acceptable at the present time for any construction purposes and particularly not for ship construction.” [TMS]
Greg Ip of the WSJ claims that the US is in a stealth manufacturing boom, though not one that’s creating jobs. “Since January 2025, manufacturing jobs have indeed fallen by about 100,000 workers, or roughly 0.6%. In the same period, though, manufacturing production rose 2.3%, and manufacturing shipments, unadjusted for inflation, climbed 4.2%.” [WSJ] But Noah Smith argues that no, we aren’t — most manufacturing indicators, once adjusted for inflation, show little to no growth. [Noahpinion]
Chinese electric car manufacturer BYD wants to open 20 dealerships in Canada this year. [GM Authority]
TSMC is apparently delaying using the latest and greatest ASML EUV machines — their High NA machines — because they’re too expensive. [Bloomberg] It’s not clear to me if this is a chance for Intel (who has purchased several High NA machines) to pull ahead, or if Intel overcorrected and made a bad call adopting them.
The changing ownership and subsequent evolution of two different US tool brands, Milwaukee and Craftsman. [Worse on Purpose]