Global Wind Power Capacity Tops Nuclear Energy For First Time (japantimes.co.jp)

mdsolar writes: The capacity of wind power generation worldwide reached 432.42 gigawatts (GW) at the end of 2015, up 17 percent from a year earlier and surpassing nuclear energy for the first time, according to data released by global industry bodies.

The generation capacity of wind farms newly built in 2015 was a record 63.01 GW, corresponding to about 60 nuclear reactors, according to the Global Wind Energy Council based in Brussels. The global nuclear power generation capacity was 382.55 GW as of Jan. 1, 2016, the London-based World Nuclear Association said.

Comments

capacity vs actual

[Anonymous Coward]

My car has the capacity to cover 240 km/h, but never will. I need sleep, the car needs repairs and fuel.

To actually surpass the output of nuclear power will we require a constant hurricane?

In other words, worthless bullshit article posted by our anti nuclear nut, mdsolar. His posts are so shitty I will readily admit to not reading the article. Typically it's just a waste of time.

Re:capacity vs actual

[Mr D from 63]

So, here is another indication of the ignorance of reporters and those who push the agenda, as capacity does not equate to electrical output. With nuclear capacity factors close to 90%, and avg global wind capacity is closer to 30%, you need about 3 or 4 times wind capacity in GW to produce an equivalent amount of electrical output in MWh.

And, of course, without base generation like nuclear, wind would not yet even be a realistic option. Wind and solar ride on the backs of traditional sources of power.

They also don't talk about how much this PR "victory" cost, and will continue to cost as the windmill replacement cycle begins.

Re:capacity vs actual

[Alomex]

With nuclear capacity factors close to 90%

Erh no. They reach 90% in the summer but throughout the year they tend to run at 60-70% capacity.

Re:capacity vs actual

[prisoner-of-enigma]

Demand tends to vary, so nuclear plants are also adjustable.

Uhhh, no. I used to work at nuclear plants for TVA as recently as last year. Nuclear plants are "base load" facilities, meaning they run at 100% (or as close to that as possible) 24x7. The variable loads are carried by other sources like hydroelectric, combined-cycle turbines, and so forth. In fact, nuclear is about the ONLY type of power generation that runs at full throttle during its entire cycle between refuelings.

The 90% factor cited by one of the other posters is more or less correct because commercial generation plants go offline for refueling about once every 18-24 months depending upon how they've been run during that fuel cycle. Things like turbine trips and other unscheduled shutdowns affect when refuelings actually occur, and only about 1/3 of the fuel is changed out every cycle.

Re:capacity vs actual

[Rei]

And, of course, without base generation like nuclear, wind would not yet even be a realistic option.

Actually, nuclear pairs pretty poorly with wind. Nuclear isn't very responsible to rapid changes. Natural gas and hydro are what usually pair with wind.

It's possible to make rapid response nuclear plants, but most aren't.

Basically, you're confusing baseload power and peaking. Peaking has of course always been with us, and always will, regardless of generation type, because even without supply fluctuations, there's also demand fluctuations (rather major ones, actually). Note that there's a number of ways to reduce supply fluctuations and to better fit the demand curve. Long distance power transmission spreads out demand peaks and evens out supply intermittency. Mixing different types of intermittent power makes a much more stable overall power. And of course there's also storage, of a wide variety of types, including some built into plants themselves (such as solar plants with thermal storage).

Re:capacity vs actual

[Alomex]

Duh! If I'm going to contradict someone I make sure to double check my figures, which I did, using statistics from the EIA.

Just because you are used to making things up without sources doesn't mean everyone else does too.

Re:capacity vs actual

[prisoner-of-enigma]

Easy: actual generation varies according to demand, and demand is highest in the summer.

Yes load varies but nuclear output does not. Nuclear is "base load" meaning it runs at full capacity from the time it's brought online until it's shut down for maintenance/refueling. The variable load is carried by assets that can be throttled economically, like combined-cycle gas turbines, hydroelectric, etc.

So, if you consider power usage as a series of troughs and peaks, "base load" facilities carry everything up to the "trough" part. The "peak" parts are carried by variable assets. Nuclear is not nearly as economical if you try throttling it. Basically you're wasting reactivity by doing so.

Re:capacity vs actual

[willy_me]

This would only apply to areas that are serviced by primarily nuclear power. In most areas it is more cost effective to leave the nuclear plants at 100% and scale down the coal / oil plants. This is due to the high cost of the plant and low cost of nuclear fuel.

Re:capacity vs actual

[prisoner-of-enigma]

Yes, but only if it's not summer and the river is to low to cool the reactor or in winter when the river is frozen or if there's another 'incident' shutting down the plant for months or a typhoon is expected or a large wave...(sic)

These events, while they have happened, have only been notable because they almost never happened before or since. There's a reason uptime figures for the nuclear industry are routinely above 90%, and that includes time spent in shutdown for scheduled maintenance and refueling.

Not to mention, when a wind turbine fails catastrophically, there's a dent in the shrubbery and not a relocation of 100.000 people for a couple of thousand years like when a reactor fails that way.

In the entire history of commercial nuclear power (almost half a century) only two events have taken place that required any sort of relocation. One of those was due to operators deliberately operating the plant outside of specifications and disregarding all safety regulations with a plant design that is no longer used because of its instability (Chernobyl). The other was at a plant that was hit by a massive earthquake followed by a massive tsunami. Tens of thousands were killed by the quake and tsunami. Zero deaths were attributed to anything nuclear.

Reports of nuclear deadliness have been greatly exaggerated. No doubt on purpose, to fit a particular agenda.

Another boon is that wind turbines don't produce material for dirty bombs that you have to guard for a couple of hundred thousand years.

This is a political failing, not a technological one. We have the ability to burn waste actinides, extracting useful energy, closing the nuclear fuel cycle, and leaving very little behind that is dangerous. President Carter banned R&D into this technology back in the 1970's and it's been a political hot potato ever since.

If uninformed alarmists like you would ever shut the hell up and actually learn something about what you're denigrating, you might see that idea reversed. But whole generations have been raised on the idea that nuclear = bad so I doubt that's going to happen. You're comfortable in your ignorance.

Re:capacity vs actual

[ShanghaiBill]

Easy: actual generation varies according to demand, and demand is highest in the summer.

No. Nukes are expensive to build but cheap to run. The marginal cost of power is very low. So when demand drops, you shut down your gas turbines so you don't have to pay for the fuel, then you shut down coal. If you have spare capacity in your reservoir, you next shut down hydropower. Nukes are the last power source that you shut down, and there is no place the relies exclusively on nukes. Even France, which is 75% nuclear, sells their excess power to Germany and Britain rather that scaling back output.

Re:capacity vs actual

[radarskiy]

Table 6.7.B. Capacity Factors for Utility Scale Generators Not Primarily Using Fossil Fuels, January 2013-November 2015: https://www.eia.gov/electricit...

From Jan 2013 to Nov 2015, the lowest capacity factor for nuclear power was 77.6%. Only two months were below 82.5%. The yearly averages were 89.9% and 91.7% for 2013 and 2014.

So EIA statistics refute your claim that you said was based on EIA statistics.

Re:capacity vs actual

[Rei]

Again, you're confusing baseload and peaking. Intermittent sources don't need baseload, they need peaking. And the amount of peaking needed is based on the reliability of the intermittent source, which is affected by the above-discussed issues.

Re:capacity vs actual

[iggymanz]

oh really? I worked at nuke plant; the correct answer in USA is "over 90%", the 60-70% number hasn't been true since the 90s

http://www.nei.org/Knowledge-C...

Re:capacity vs actual

[TheRealHocusLocus]

Since nobody has come up with a final solution to the waste problem, the costs are infinite.

Could I say, "Until we come up with a solution to the wind-doesn't-blow-all-the-time problem or the ice-storms-can-fuck-em-up-completely problem... the costs are infinite?

Half of the 'final solution' is to fast-burn all the old waste and make energy from it.
The waste will sit there patiently until we can do this.
The other half of the 'final solution' is a new generation of reactors that do not generate long-lived waste.
The basic concept for this was developed 60 years ago by Weinberg.
In the world I live in we consider these to be problems to solve.
What kind of world do you live in??

Discussing energy topics in these forums is beginning to feel like trying to explain to Elmo why he can't have Christmas every day . "But Santa Claus, Elmo wants Christmas every day! Santa gave Elmo three wishes. They're Elmo's wishes! And Elmo wished for Christmas every day!" Elmo wished for wind and solar power, he thinks the storage problem will solve itself with GrapheneOrSomethingSomehow(tm), Elmo thinks fusion is tomorrow, Elmo wants hydropower in Arizona, Elmo wants to place an iron cap over Yellowstone.

And Elmo hates nuclear energy --- because his parents hate it --- or because they don't. Elmo has not researched the matter.

___
Please see Thorium Remix, collected rants on Slashdot and these letters on energy,
  To The Honorable James M. Inhofe, United States Senate
  To whom it may concern, Halliburton Corporate
Also of interest, Faulkner [2005]: Electric Pipelines for North American Power Grid Efficiency Security

Re:capacity vs actual

[iggymanz]

wrong. they run at fully rated power except near refueling outages as insulation is removed for inspections and repairs and efficiency goes down.

yes, former nuclear pre-outage and outage scheduler here

the 60-70% number was accurate in the 1980s, in the 90s went from 75 to 90% by 2000 where it has hovered for the last 15+ years

Re:capacity vs actual

[angel'o'sphere]

Lets start with this: the mass hysteria of 2011
There was no mass hysteria. And certainly not in Germany.

(2011) caused idiots to pull the plug on nuclear,
The "pulling the plug" was decided 2000 not 2011! However the next government decided to extend the runtime of nuclear reactors, partly significantly, that actually is the same Government that 2011 finally decided to "pull the plug", for good this time.

Now to the physics. Basically all modern plants in Europe "can load follow".
The problem is, depending on plant design, that you either have to shift it up quite soon after powering it down again (less than 20 mins), or you have to wait 6h or more until you can. Obviously daytime fluctuation is short, and only the slow reaction time prevents the nuclear plants to truly "follow load".

However all the moments you power it down needs to be well timed. You either have to now you power it up quite soon, or you don't want to, for more than 6h.

Your argument regarding Germanys plants, is rather weird. And I doubt Germanys plants truly ever where in "load follow" mode.

E.g. between roughly 3:00 and 5:00 the load in Germany is the lowest. The "true load" is even below base load. Base load is kept "artificially high" to sell power to France for refilling their pumped storage and is used to refill Germanys pumped storage, too. Now imagine a surplus of lets say 1GW of wind power, probably unexpected -- does not matter -- around 4:00. You have a forecast that the wind power will be on that surplus level for more than 30 minutes.

Now as explained above, you can not simply power down a nuclear plant. A single block is yielding below 1GW, so you have at least to power down lets say four blocks from so you are down by 250MW on each (you power them down from ~90% to ~65%)? However: you already know, you need to power them up again, at the latest when "the day starts", between 6:00 and 7:00. But because of the Boron poisoning you can't. 6:00 and 7:00 are still in the 6h window or gap you have before you can power the reactors up again.

So you have two choices:
a) power a certain amount of reactors down, knowing you need them later but can't utilize them, so you will have to power up other plants earlier (more expensive plants) or additional plants even
b) you sell that surplus power, now we come to the question why that might lead to negative prices

In a) you trade cheap power that you can not produce in future, because you can not use the plants, for expensive power you can produce your own.
In b) you sell your excess power, hopefully for a good enough price, even if negative that the extra plants in a) are not needed. So in other words, you safe money by selling power below 0 but don't have to produce power later at a high price.

This dilemma was most certainly not fixed by letting German plants running in "load following" mode. After all we have mainly old plants.

There are other reasons for negative prices. E.g. excluding certain market members from buying the power. So only other power companies with storage capacity can buy it. Basically a deal amoung friends: you buy my power now for a negative price, I buy yours at appropriated time.

Keep in mind: consumption and production needs to match, so if one buys 1GW for 8h for a negative price: he needs to consume it right away. That is in 90% of all cases one who has pumped storage spare capacity, or one who was speculating on such a situation and has a ready but idle aluminium plant or steel plant.

Re:capacity vs actual

[stooo]

>> Since nobody has come up with a final solution to the waste problem, the costs are infinite.
Yep. And nuke utilities do not even try to calculate that cost. They leave it to the taxpayers.

Max Capacity

[neonv]

This assumes all wind is blowing everywhere in the world to maximize the capacity of wind power. Unless that is happening, nuclear is still ahead.

Re:Max Capacity

[Anonymous Coward]

Nuclear plants are being decommissioned and not replaced. The opposite trend is in place with wind power. Regardless of the assumptions that went into the article, the trend is crystal clear.

Re: Max Capacity

[Mr D from 63]

Actually, in the US, most nuclear units have had their licenses extended beyond the initial 40 year term. In fact, there are over 70 units that have done so. Only a few have shut down, each for different reasons and each near the end of their original design life.

Re:Max Capacity

[CCarrot]

actually, nukes are being built all over the world. The west is not, but that is due to too many that do not have a decent science background
 

^^^ This.

Here's an interesting article looking at nuclear power futures from a less west-centric point of view.

From the article link (emphasis mine):

It should not be assumed that reactors will close when their licence is due to expire, since licence renewal is now common. However, new plants coming on line are balanced by old plants being retired. Over 1996-2015, 75 reactors were retired as 80 started operation. There are no firm projections for retirements over the next two decades, but the World Nuclear Association estimates that at least 60 of those now operating will close by 2030, most being small plants. The 2013 WNA Market Report reference case has 74 reactors closing by 2030, using very conservative assumptions about licence renewal, and 272 coming on line, including 108 in China.

Even if half of those planned reactors never get built, that's still a net increase. The west is still pretty spoiled, in that we still have huge tracts of land with relatively few people to worry about. In places where population pressures are more intense, and land is not so freely available, nuclear is absolutely the best (sometimes the only) option if you want to allow people access to any sort of electrical service, not to mention supply the industries that are providing work for your population.

So?

[Glock27]

Wind maximum capacity is pretty meaningless, I believe the average production is around 1/3 of rated.

Nuclear is a far superior power source, given it's low land use, lack of environmental impact (eyesores, noise, bird/bat kills for wind) and constant output. Nuclear plants should be built out to completely replace coal, at a minimum.

Re:So?

[DamonHD]

I like nukes (and solar and wind), but let's not forget the tiny tiny issues around radioactive fuel and waste, and the fact that nukes are pretty difficult to turn down to match variable load, and tend to fail in large blocks which causes the grid big problems.

The capacity factor of nukes is not 100% either (and indeed was only about twice that of wind in the UK), though I do agree that comparing name-plate ratings for intermittent renewables with run-always generators is unhelpful.

Rgds

Damon

Re:So?

[Mr D from 63]

If nuclear was far superior, we'd be installing more of it.

We are. The global nuclear capacity is increasing. And, if it were not for base sources such as nuclear, gas, & coal, wind would not even be a viable option.

Re:So?

[Anonymous Coward]

The nice thing about coal is that all the radioactive waste is pumped into the atmosphere.
That's so much better. No need to store anything.

Re:So?

[DamonHD]

Actually no, AFAIK.

Only one nuke in the UK *can* even load follow, and never has. (My uncle was chief counsel that got it through the public enquiry; I'm really not against nukes at all.)

France has a nuke fleet that can nominally load follow, but how much depends on the age of the fuel and ranges from ~50% down to 0 IIRC, for an average of maybe 25% across the fleet, which is one of the reasons that nukes are limited to ~75% of French generation capacity, ie so that enough following can be provided by other means (given a typical 2:1 ratio between high and low demand). That is the best of my understanding, and I ran it past the UK's former energy minister recently who I was sharing a platform with on nuclear electricity generation, and he did not disagree, though maybe he was just being polite.

So, if even the French have not been able to get a fully load-following fleet I think it must be very hard to do.

So, again, I am simply not anti-nuke. Nor am I a frothing fan-boy. Nukes do not solve all problems and are most useful as part of a mixed fleet IMHO.

Rgds

Damon

Re:So?

[Sique]

Yes, that's why Hinkley Point needs to secure 35 billion in subsidies just to get built, and still EdF and CGNP Group wonder if they can weasel out of the construction contract. Even nuclear friendly France, China and UK bound together seem not to be able to built a nuclear reactor that can compete with solar and wind on a free market.

Re:So?

[David_Hart]

> If nuclear was far superior, we'd be installing more of it.

Right. The world is completely rational and efficient.

I agree that Nuclear is superior for the simple reason that it is efficient and provides consistent power. Yes, bad things can happen. But modern designs are much safer.

As for popularity, well... Justin Beiber, Paris Hilton, Kardashians... I think that I made my point.. Just because something is popular doesn't mean that it's a good decision or superior.

I just want to point out that it's not an either/or situation. Personally, I love solar and wish we had much more of it in the US. Panels are finally getting to the point where they are efficient enough to make economic sense in the North East US and Canada. I'm less bullish on wind power. My concern has to do with the number of bird kills. Birds eat insects, including mosquitoes, and I hate mosquitoes. The most promising, in my opinion, is tidal power. But, then, we might end up disturbing fishing grounds. Everything has a trade-off...

Re:So?

[slashping]

Wind maximum capacity is pretty meaningless, I believe the average production is around 1/3 of rated.

In that case, the number isn't meaningless. You just need to divide it by 3.

Re:So?

[Solandri]

Nuclear capacity factor is about 90%.

Wind capacity factor is about 25%. It varies from about 20% in non-choice locations to about 30% in good areas. Offshore is higher. Especially good areas offshore often hit 40%, while the best areas (off Scotland) can hit 60%.

The way load works, nuclear and coal provide base load. Renewables provide whatever they can on top of that. Gas and especially hydro handles the dynamic load - making generation match actual demand. So nuclear not being good at following the exact load curve is not a problem. It only becomes a problem if you're like most renewable fans who insist that only hydro, wind, and solar generate all the electricity.

The best way to match demand is (at least) one base load source + (at least) one dynamic generation source. Variable (unpredictable) sources like wind and solar can be added n on top of base load as an option. They reduce the base generation requirement, but put more stress on dynamic generation since it may be called upon to cover a shortfall in the variable source. Consequently, they're the least desirable power source - you still need a base load generation source and a dynamic load generation source.

Re:So?

[DamonHD]

Actually I'm inclined to regard "baseload" as an artifact of how we have traditionally managed generation systems, eg the way the domestic consumption (and Economy 7 in particular) were encouraged basically to provide demand when factories weren't. Throw in lots of cheap local storage and baseload demand might simply evaporate making nukes hard to use; I know it's not happening yet, but the point is that baseload is an emergent and contingent property, not a fundamental one, IMHO.

And your use of the term "least desirable" is only in the eyes of the grid managers. I don't much like the long-term externalities of some of the non-renewable generation methods.

In any case we're agreed that a mix is good, and sources have pros and cons.

Rgds

Damon

Re:So?

[DanielRavenNest]

> Wind capacity factor is about 25%.

In the US, in 2014, it was:

Coal 61%
Natural Gas Combined Cycle 48.3%
Nuclear 91.7%
Hydro 37.3%
Wind 34.0%
Photovoltaic 25.9%
Geothermal 74%

Source: https://www.eia.gov/electricit... and https://www.eia.gov/electricit...

Re:So?

[Mr D from 63]

Yes, because of huge subsidies and incentives. Even Warren Buffet said he only invests in wind project because the goverment gifts, otherwise they would be losers. And before you go screaming 'nuclear gets bigger subsidies', check your numbers. On a per MWH generated or to be generated basis, solar and wind get many times more than any other power source ever devised.

Re:So?

[shawn2772]

According to https://www.oecd-nea.org/ndd/r...:

Modern nuclear plans with light water reactors have strong manoeuvring capabilities. Nuclear power plants in France and in Germany operate in load-following mode, i.e. participate in the primary and secondary frequency control, and some units follow a variable load programme with one or two large power changes per day. In France, load-following is needed to balance daily and weekly power variations of the electricity supply and demand, since nuclear power plants have a large share in the national mix. In Germany, load-following became important in recent years when a large share of intermittent sources of electricity generation (e.g. wind) was introduced to the national mix.

The minimum requirements for the manoeuvrability capabilities of the modern reactors are defined by the utilities requirements that are based on the requirements of the grid operators. For example, according to the current version of the European Utilities Requirements (EUR) the NPP must at least be capable of daily load cycling operation between 50% and 100% of its rated power P r , with a rate of change of electric output of 3-5% of P r per minute.

Most of the modern designs implement even higher manoeuvrability capabilities, with the possibility of planned and unplanned load-following in the wide power range and with ramps of 5%P r per minute. Some designs are capable of extremely fast power modulations in the frequency regulation mode with ramps of several percent of the rated power per second, in the narrow band around the power level. The economic consequences of load-following are mainly related to the reduction of the load factor. In the case of nuclear, fuel costs represent a small fraction of the electricity generating cost, if compared with fissile sources. Thus, operating at higher load factors is profitable for nuclear power plants, since they cannot make savings on the fuel cost while not producing electricity. In France, the impact of load- following on the average unit capability factor is sometimes estimated as about 1.2%.

Since most of the currently used nuclear power plants implement strong manoeuvrability capabilities in their designs (except for some very old NPPs), there is no or very small impact (within the design margins) of the load-following on acceleration of ageing of large equipment components. However, there is some influence of the load-following on the ageing of some operational components (e.g. valves), and thus one can expect a slight increase of the maintenance costs. Also, for older plants some additional investment could be needed, especially in instrumentation and control, in order to become eligible for operation in the load-following mode.

Wind will equal nuclear when...

[Applehu Akbar]

These figures are for nameplate, or maximum possible output, of each turbine. First you have to triple the number of installed turbines, so that the capacity factor comes out to about the same availability as nuclear. Then we have to attach those turbines to Smart Grid, which when it exists will allow fluctuating renewables to shuttle their output across large distances (windy in Texas this morning, in South Dakota later in the day).

The first element of Smart Grid is the smart meter, which will report continuous load information to the grid and eventually be able to turn your major appliances on and off to match supply. These meters are hotly opposed by Greens because they radio their reading to the utility or as the Greens put it, "emit radiation."

Re:Wind will equal nuclear when...

[Anonymous Coward]

But you will install them yourself once they introduce live pricing

Re:Wind will equal nuclear when...

[slashping]

The pricing just needs to be more accurate, not aggressive. In fact, your Tesla Powerwall would work much better if the electricity provider would tell you accurate pricing for the next 24 hours, so you could optimize when to charge and when to provide back to the grid.

Nuclear reactors

[penguinoid]

Nuclear reactors were a fad that will soon blow over.

Celebrate When Annual Production Exceeds Nuclear

[careysub]

I am a big wind energy supporter, but this isn't a very meaningful milestone, although it is a sign of the rapid emergence of large scale wind power.

When wind energy production in annual gigawatt hours exceeds nuclear power, that will be something indeed. That will happen of current trends continue, but not until 2030 or so.

/. Readers Attack What They Think Headline Says

[jeffb (2.718)]

...film at 11.

Folks, it clearly says Power Capacity. Power, not energy, and capacity, not average actual output. The headline and summary are precise and correct. But if you're deprived of your usual stalking points -- people trying to report power in kWh or energy in kW -- I guess you have no choice but to accuse the authors of not really meaning Exactly. What. They. Said.

Nuclear 80%-90% & reliable. Wind 20%-30% &

[raymorris]

It doesn't make a lot of sense to compare wind vs nuclear because they are used for different purposes, in a 3-way mix, but ...

> How does average nuclear production compare to its maximum capacity?

Nuclear ranges between 80%-90%, wind is 20-30%.

The benefit of wind is that it allows you to turn down your natural gas plants whenever the wind happens to be favorable.

Nuclear can't be quickly and easily throttled up and down. That's it's one actual weakness - it's reliable, etc. (There was a purely political weakness , but environmentalists are now undoing the damage they did back in 1960s, admitting it was a mistake).

So what you do, if you want clean, reliable power (rather than purely political points) is you have nuclear and hydro for the minimum load, because they are steady. You have wind and MAYBE solar to get what you can, whenever nature wants to allow it, and natural gas to make the difference. You throttle the natural gas plants up and down to meet the difference between current demand and current supply from wind + nuclear/ hydro.

Hydro is nice, in very specific locations, most of which are already in use. So it's an important source of power, but can't be increased much.

First time???

[freya_bacchus]

I thoght we had windmills an the 17th century already, but guess i was wrong as slashdot is always right

Re:Then compare average production

[DanielRavenNest]

> Regardless, if wind power production keeps growing this quickly (it likely will because windows power is so cheap--nuclear isn't), then its average production will probably overtake nuclear sooner rather than later. I'm not saying that's good or bad; it's just how it is.

I know it's bad form to introduce facts into this kind of discussion, but here is US Net generation by source:

https://www.eia.gov/electricit... and https://www.eia.gov/electricit...

Since 2005, total US utility generation has remained roughly constant at about 4,100 TeraWatt-hours. As of the 12 months ending November 2015, Coal supplied 1,391; Natural Gas = 1,314; Nuclear = 801, Hydro = 250, Wind = 183, Wood = 42.5 and Photovoltaic = 22.6.

The change since 2005 was Nuclear +20, Hydro -20, Wind +165, and Photovoltaic +22.6. It will take a while for wind to pass nuclear, but Wind+Photovoltaic will pass Hydro in a couple of years. The really big shift in the last decade is Coal -622 and Natural Gas +553. Coal is on it's way out.

XFD, did you really just call wind power an agenda

[Rujiel]

Yes, that terrible, evil Renewables lobby, which buys politicians and pundits, hires think tanks, and pays internet trolls... oh wait, that's what the nuclear and fossil fuel industries do. The rest of us just want a less polluted world. So spare me your talk of "agendas".

Re:Nuclear 80%-90% & reliable. Wind 20%-30% &a

[Ichijo]

You throttle the natural gas plants up and down to meet the difference between current demand and current supply from wind + nuclear/ hydro.

Or you throttle demand up and down to meet current supply from wind + nuclear/hydro. Smart meters help with this.