Cost of electricity

[SkepticLance]

There has been, at various times, a lot of discussion about various methods of generating electricity. In various arguments, cost is discussed. I have just read in my local paper (NZ Herald) an article on this, and they quote the US Electric Power Research Institute on the following costs. These are all in US cents per kilowatt hour.

 

Coal 6 cents. But this rises to 10 cents if carbon capture is required.

Wind 10 cents

Nuclear 7.5 cents

Solar panel 25 cents.

 

Obviously, there will be a lot of variability. For example : coal rises in cost if the generating plant is a long way from coal beds, requiring transport. It is also true that these relative costs will alter with changing technology in the future, and things are changing quickly.

 

This article did not mention natural gas or hydroelectric, but I managed to get data from other sites.

 

Natural Gas 6 cents

Hydroelectric 5.6 cents. Assumes it is a large facility with a lot of water resource.

 

If we assume that the power generation must be as close to carbon neutral as possible, then this leaves us with ...

 

1. Hydroelectric at 5.6 cents - but only possible if the resource exists.

2. Nuclear at 7.5 cents.

3. Wind at 10 cents.

4. Solar, trailing well behind at 25 cents.

 

Any comments???

[CDarwin]

Does that include up-front costs? (I'm assuming it doesn't include collateral costs from environmental impact, which would vary from generation site to generation site in any event.)

[iNow]

I'd like to see the source they used. The numbers don't smell right.

[Mr Skeptic]

I've seen similar numbers. Don't know whether they are biased or not. However, the costs in specific circumstances could be far higher or lower. Solar-on-a-roof will be cheaper than a dedicated solar plant, and non-local power will be more expensive in remote areas, etc. Nuclear has research benefits. Coal has pollution and CO2. etc, etc.

 

I too would like to know how they calculated it.

[Phi for All]

The costs of building integrated solar are spread out over the lifetime of the system, and I assume wind is the same, so they do include the up-front costs and have no "clean-up factor". Is coal, nuclear and hydroelectric figured the same way?

[SkepticLance]

I cannot give definitive explanations of how this data was calculated, since it was just a part of an article on electrical generation. I too have seen similar data before. I do not believe that it includes environmental costs, except for the 10 cents for coal burning with carbon collection.

 

I know that the major costs for nuclear are in the capital cost of building and the cost of decommissioning. I seriously doubt that such a reputable organisation as the EPRI would quote 7.5 cents unless it included those major costs.

 

Obviously the costs are overall averages, and will vary from site to site - probably substantially. The article mentioned that coal burning power stations in parts of the east of the USA, well away from coal fields, cost more than nuclear, due to the cost of transporting coal.

[iNow]

The reason I asked is because I'm actually hearing of costs for solar panels at $1.00 per kwh, but that's not a number that contexted around end-users.

 

I am curious if the numbers are on the manufacturing side, the consumer side, both, if they include installation, if they include upkeep, etc...

 

I'm not asking about the environmental costs, although those would be very useful in such a dialog as well.

[swansont]

The solar costs probably do not reflect large-scale commercial production, and may be an average including residential roof-mounted units, which are more expensive per kWh. or it assumes some average insolation, which obviously varies with location. Solar has reached grid parity in some places, such as Italy.