page_title: Power station
section_title: Typical power output
hierarchical_section_title: Power station / Typical power output
caption_attribution_description: English: Koeberg nuclear power station
context_page_description: A power station, also referred to as a power plant and sometimes generating station or generating plant, is an industrial facility for the generation of electric power. Power stations are generally connected to an electrical grid.
  Many power stations contain one or more generators, a rotating machine that converts mechanical power into three-phase electric power. The relative motion between a magnetic field and a conductor creates an electric current.
  The energy source harnessed to turn the generator varies widely. Most power stations in the world burn fossil fuels such as coal, oil, and natural gas to generate electricity. Clean energy sources include nuclear power, and an increasing use of renewables such as solar, wind, wave, geothermal, and hydroelectric.
context_section_description: The power generated by a power station is measured in multiples of the watt, typically megawatts (10⁶ watts) or gigawatts (10⁹ watts). Power stations vary greatly in capacity depending on the type of power plant and on historical, geographical and economic factors. The following examples offer a sense of the scale.
  Many of the largest operational onshore wind farms are located in the USA. As of 2011, the Roscoe Wind Farm is the second largest onshore wind farm in the world, producing 781.5 MW of power, followed by the Horse Hollow Wind Energy Center (735.5 MW). As of July 2013, the London Array in United Kingdom is the largest offshore wind farm in the world at 630 MW, followed by Thanet Offshore Wind Project in United Kingdom at 300 MW.
  As of 2015, the largest photovoltaic (PV) power plants in the world are led by Longyangxia Dam Solar Park in China, rated at 850 megawatts.
  Solar thermal power stations in the U.S. have the following output:
  The country's largest solar facility at Kramer Junction has an output of 354 MW
  The Blythe Solar Power Project planned production is estimated at 485 MW
  Large coal-fired, nuclear, and hydroelectric power stations can generate hundreds of megawatts to multiple gigawatts. Some examples:
  The Koeberg Nuclear Power Station in South Africa has a rated capacity of 1860 megawatts.
  The coal-fired Ratcliffe-on-Soar Power Station in the UK has a rated capacity of 2 gigawatts.
  The Aswan Dam hydro-electric plant in Egypt has a capacity of 2.1 gigawatts.
  The Three Gorges Dam hydro-electric plant in China has a capacity of 22.5 gigawatts.
  Gas turbine power plants can generate tens to hundreds of megawatts. Some examples:
  The Indian Queens simple-cycle, or open cycle gas turbine (OCGT), peaking power station in Cornwall UK, with a single gas turbine is rated 140 megawatts.
  The Medway Power Station, a combined-cycle gas turbine (CCGT) power station in Kent, UK with two gas turbines and one steam turbine, is rated 700 megawatts.
  The rated capacity of a power station is nearly the maximum electrical power that the power station can produce.
  Some power plants are run at almost exactly their rated capacity all the time, as a non-load-following base load power plant, except at times of scheduled or unscheduled maintenance.
  However, many power plants usually produce much less power than their rated capacity.
  In some cases a power plant produces much less power than its rated capacity because it uses an intermittent energy source.
  Operators try to pull maximum available power from such power plants, because their marginal cost is practically zero, but the available power varies widely—in particular, it may be zero during heavy storms at night.
  In some cases operators deliberately produce less power for economic reasons.
  The cost of fuel to run a load following power plant may be relatively high, and the cost of fuel to run a peaking power plant is even higher—they have relatively high marginal costs.
  Operators keep power plants turned off ("operational reserve") or running at minimum fuel consumption ("spinning reserve") most of the time.
  Operators feed more fuel into load following power plants only when the demand rises above what lower-cost plants (i.e., intermittent and base load plants) can produce, and then feed more fuel into peaking power plants only when the demand rises faster than the load following power plants can follow.
caption: The Koeberg Nuclear Power Station, South Africa
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