Value chain · CLM-0300
In plain terms
The main international definition of LCOE is the flat price per unit of electricity a power plant would need to be paid, every year of its life, to break even overall.
The claim as recorded
IEA and the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency define levelised cost of electricity as the constant discounted lifetime cost per megawatt hour that would let a generator recover all of its costs, given by LCOE = sum of discounted annual capital, O&M, fuel, carbon and decommissioning costs divided by sum of discounted annual output, and describe it as "the principal tool for comparing the plant-level unit costs of different baseload technologies over their operating lifetimes."
Evidence behind this: T3, and NOT re-graded on 2026-09-11 although `tiercheck.py` flags it, because the answer is a rule the register does not have rather than a judgement about this record. The weakest cited source is SRC-146, Lazard's LCOE+ 2026 at T4. SRC-146 supplies NOTHING this claim asserts. Read first-hand: its PDF p.25 is a worked calculation sheet, not a definition - 300 MW capacity, 55 per cent capacity factor, levelised energy cost $36.7/MWh, run to year 30. The definition, the equation this claim reproduces and the quoted sentence about plant-level unit costs all belong to SRC-161, IEA/NEA at T3, which the src field cites first and where support locates them. Lazard corroborates by METHOD, not by wording. So the open question is whether a source cited only to corroborate sets the tier floor. The ruling of 2026-09-03 says a claim resting on sources of several tiers takes the weakest, and says it flatly; reading an exception into it here would be a method change made by a coordinator to clear a count. The violation is left standing and visible, which is the same reasoning that kept all 22 unre-graded until evidence existed: a visible contradiction beats an invisible one.
Scope and limits
This is IEA/NEA's own definition, stated to be developed for "regulated electricity markets with stable tariffs" (p.33). It does not itself establish whether LCOE is appropriate for a specific technology comparison; see CLM-0306.
What it assumes
No assumptions are recorded against this claim.
Where it comes from
PSRC-01 p.33: "The LCOE is the principal tool for comparing the plant-level unit costs of different baseload technologies over their operating lifetimes." p.35, Equation (2): LCOE = P_MWh = sum[(Capital_t + O&M_t + Fuel_t + Carbon_t + D_t) x (1+r)^-t] / sum[MWh x (1+r)^-t].
Related records
- Answers question
- QST-021 not published in this release
Cite this
energyaperture.com/c/clm-0300
CLM-0300, Energy Aperture, as of 2020-12.
Connected records
Other published records linked to this one. A list, not a judgement.
- Also from SRC-146
- CLM-0263A widely used financial-industry cost report estimates 2026 U.S. power costs, without subsidy, as follows: utility solar 40-98 dollars per...CLM-0265The same report assumes, by default, that a power project is financed 60 percent by debt (at 8 percent interest) and 40 percent by equity...CLM-0266The report itself warns that its main headline cost figures leave out the wider costs of running a reliable power grid, things like power...CLM-0303A major financial advisory firm's own widely-used LCOE report says plainly that its numbers do not cover intermittency or total system cost.CLM-0312A major financial advisory firm has estimated, using US grid operators' own published figures, what it adds to the cost of wind or solar to...CLM-0470The same financial-industry report separately estimates what it costs to make solar and wind power as reliable as an always-on power plant...CLM-0524Every UK-specific or typical-country cost-of-capital figure found sits well below the 20% rate Frazer-Nash used, even at the top of DESNZ's...
- Also from SRC-161
- CLM-0301The IEA itself says plain LCOE misses how useful a power plant is to the wider electricity system, which is why it built a second, add-on...CLM-0304The interest rate assumed changes an LCOE figure a lot, and most for plants that cost the most to build: in a 2020 international study...CLM-0305How long a power plant is assumed to last matters much less to its cost per unit of electricity than the interest rate does.CLM-0308The IEA's alternative metric adds credit for how much a power plant helps keep the grid reliable, on top of its raw energy cost, but the...
- Also from SRC-174
- CLM-0302The US government's own energy statistics agency warns that comparing plain LCOE across different kinds of power plant, without also...CLM-0307The US government's avoided-cost metric shows that, for the power plants it expects to be built, value and cost are within about 25 percent...CLM-0315Even though NASA's own figures say space solar power's carbon footprint is about as good as five renewable sources of power on the ground...
- Cited in articles