1. Introduction

1.1. Introduction

2. Key electricity generation assets.

2.1. Introduction

2.2. Hydro units

2.3. Wind units

2.4. Onshore versus Offshore units

2.5. Coal and Oil units

2.6. Natural gas units OCGT / CCGT 2.7. Nuclear units 2.8. Biomass units 2.9. Geothermal units 2.10. Tidal units 2.11. Solar Photovoltaic units 2.12. Concentrated Solar Power units 3. Technical characteristics of power stations 3.1. Introduction 3.2. Installed capacity 3.3. Technological maturity 3.4. Capacity factor 3.5. Availability factor 3.6. Ramp rates 3.7. Startup times 3.8. Minimum stable generation 3.9. Efficiency 3.10. Dispatchability 3.11. Flexibility 3.12. Baseload and peaking units 3.13. Emissions intensity 4. Understanding the capacity factors 4.1. Introduction 4.2. Capacity factors for wind units 4.3. Capacity factors for base plants 4.4. Capacity factors for hydro plants 4.5. Why can a capacity factor be small? 4.6. Capacity factor for nuclear units: 1-hour granularity 4.7. Capacity factor for nuclear units: 3-hour granularity 5. Conclusions 5.1. Overview