Question

please compare and contrast the capital costs and operating costs of the various forms of electricity generation in the US

Answer 1

Various capital costs are incurred for electrical generation as below:

• Natural gas turbine
• Onshore wind plants
• Offshore wind plants
• Coal and Nuclear power plant
• Solar and photovoltaic technology equipment
• Geothermal and Biomass
• Hydroelectric plants

Operating costs listed are as follows:

• Labor
• Rawmaterial
• Maintainence
• Employee salary
• Disposal of waste
• Logistical and IT support.

Here we can see that capital costs usually form chunk of expenditure and is must for investment and production Whereas operating costs which is also known as revenue expenditure comprises of maintaining and operating expenses for proper condition and supervision and enhanced productivity. These costs are always much lower in capital intensive industries like Electricity power generation.