[pydry]

I didn't realize it went as low as that.

Some wind farms can hit 65%

https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/worlds-first-fl...

[simonh]

True but with nuclear you can usually schedule the downtime well in advance. With wind it just stops whenever, whether you’re ready for it or not.

[btreecat]

Funny enough, this is why you see wind farms where there is a decent prevailing wind.

The biggest issue is usually our lack of capacity to store/transmit. They shut of some turbines because they over produce for the Network capacity.

[7952]

But downtime of a turbine only affects one turbine. The rest can carry on as normal and generate power. With nuclear you can lose 1000MW all at once.

[pydry]

You have to fire up the gas generators either way to fill in the gaps.

Scheduled nuclear downtime isnt any greener than the a slow wind day.

[olejorgenb]

That's the same as saying nuclear can hit 95% while the real-world average is more like 80%. For wind that number seems to be around 40% (both land and offshore from a quick search). Guess the jury is out on how more extensive maintenance will affect these projects(?), but down time for wind turbines are probably a lot less than for nuclear plants.

Capacity factors for wind projects surely are highly dependent on location, not just technology. Remains to be seen how many premium locations are suitable?