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A comment on Investment Risk Is Highest for Nuclear Power Plants, Lowest for Solar. Parent comment

Re:Investment Risk Is Highest for Nuclear Power Plants, Lowe... by leftbit on Saturday May 31, 2025 @08:17AM (#44143758)
Had. Now we have the "Merit Order Principle". Cheap energy (i.e. renewables) are used first but the price is determined by the most expensive energy source running. (See https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merit-Order)

So if you're running a solar park you have production costs of about 5ct/kWh. But if there's also a gas plant running you get maybe 20ct/kWh. Instaprofit.

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stromgestehungskosten

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Re:Investment Risk Is Highest for Nuclear Power Plants, Lowe... by loehnsberg on Saturday May 31, 2025 @08:47AM (#44143911)
Uniform pricing creates huge windfall profits for those cheap generators too, which incentivizes more investment. I‘m not saying there‘s collusion but the incentive to keep a gas turbine in the stack is clearly given.
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