Power generation cost

The cost of generating electricity from wind has fallen dramatically. In the 1980s, wind power generation cost as much as 30 cents per kilowatt-hour. Today, that cost has dropped closer to five cents to seven cents per hour, after factoring in tax credits and government incentives. The industry s goal today is to enhance wind technologies and systems to the point that wind is competitive without... 

A combination of small capacity turbines (extraction and backpressure type) may be considered with the balance amount steam sent to a condensing-type turbine for power generation. Cost of steam and power shall also be taken into account before the final decision is taken. 

U.S. overnight capital cost less than 1500/kW in 1993 and a power generation cost that is competitive with coal on an average US site. 

The GT-MHR design directly couples the reactor with a turbogenerator in a closed helium Brayton cycle to produce electricity with 48% net plant efficiency. This high efficiency and the expansion of the power output to 600 MW(t) within the existing GT-MHR physical envelope results in a substantial reduction in the busbar power costs compared to the steam cycle modular helium reactors. The power generation costs are forther reduced by the simplified operation and maintenance required of the gas turbine plant, as compared to the steam cycle plant with its much more complicated balance of plant. 

The United States Department of Energy sponsors many research projects, particularly into next-generation pressurized fluid bed combustion combined-cycle power plants. The goal is to design plants with a net system efficiency of more than 50 percent, extremely low sulfur and nitrogen oxide emissions well below 2010 emission limits, and at a power-generation cost of three-quarters by a conventional coal-fired power plant. The European Union similarly sponsors research in this area, as does Japan and other developed or developing countries. 

More recently, power generation cost for the MSR and a pressurized water reactor (PWR) was re-evaluated at the LLNL [XXX-20], using the original evaluation by the ORNL [XXX-2, XXX-19], To make a fair comparison, a 1 GW(e) plant size was assumed for both plants. Five cost components were considered, including capital cost, O M cost, fuel cost, waste disposal cost, and decommissioning cost. Assuming the capacity factor of the MSR as 90% and 80% for the PWR, the results are shown in Table XXX-3 the conclusion is that the MSR could be 20% to 25% cheaper than the PWR in total power generation cost. 

TABLE XXX-3. POWER GENERATION COST COMPONENTS OF A MSR (US cent/kWh)... 

Both the development expenditures occurred before 1979 and the net savings obtained in power generating costs by operating a number of CIRENE reactors after 1979 tnay be referred to the year 1979. 

Fig. 3.21 shows the power generation cost by summing up the above capital, operation, and fuel cycle costs. The power generation cost is 3.2 US0/kWh at the load factor of 90% and increases to 3.45 US0/kWh at a reduced factor reduced of 80%. The GTHTR300 offers a 20% cost advantage over the 4.42 US0/kWh of LWR estimated by FEPC. 

Power generation cost (cents/kWh) Figure 3.21 Power generation cost. 

In Japan, the first supercritical FPP, Anegasaki No.l started operation in 1967 with a rated power of 600 MWe. The supercritical FPP technologies have been improved constantly in Japan because of the high fossil fuel prices. Since fuel cost is the major part of the power generation cost in FPPs, improvement of the thermal efficiency would reduce the power cost. The sliding pressure plant Hirono No. 1 was deployed in 1980. It operates at subcritical pressure at partial load. Japanese... 

The SOFC is expected to be used as a distributed power generation (DG) device in an energy network, so that the fabrication and power generation costs should be competitive with those of conventional power generation devices. The cost-reduction in the cell and stack fabrication is the most important target for realization of SOFCs in DG market. 

In natural convection plants, there are opportunities for the limits to be set by the absolute power output available from naturally convective flow, and the onset of instability in that flow. We are interested in the ultimate or maximum power output in order to both minimize power generation costs (both capital and operating), and to decide or determine how far the natural circulation designs can be developed. We call this a hypothetical design, to indicate the conceptual nature of the analysis. 

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