Picking a powerplant

[necroascendant 0]

I wanted to ask about the different types of power plants and which one is better or worse for different city setups or specializations.  

So far playing the game Ive found the following

Wind Power: worthless, doesn’t provide much power, takes up a lot of space. But I have yet to see one in action with the Vertical Turbine attachments. I hope they make this plant worthwhile because I think they look kinda cool, (also doesn’t use any water.)

 

Coal: provide a good amount of power but runs out of coal quickly and relies on global coal deliveries. It only ever did me good when I had a coal mine going and could restock it with coal locally. Also the amount of pollution generated has people constantly complaining about germ levels no matter how far I place it from them. Have yet to see if the “Clean Coal” generator is worth it, but by the time I could research one I was out of coal to mine and had to restructure my city.

 

Oil: I have yet to play around with the Oil plant but I imagine it works just like the coal power plant. It looks like it produces a good amount of power but will have the downside of needing a continues supply of oil to run it in addition to the pollution it creates. I have doubts about the “clean oil” generators worth because by they’d be researched the plant would be relying on global deliveries.

 

Solar: This provides an ok amount of power at first but when a city really begins growing it always falls short of power demands. However when you can upgrade it attach Solar arrays it becomes a whole different story. With the Solar Arrays it provides a great amount of power (even for the amount of space it takes up) and it uses no water from your city lines. The only downside I could tell is its space usage, and possibly more power problems for very large cities, but I have yet to get so far.

 

Nuclear: a lot of people seems to have problems with their plants melting down but I have never had this problem, even in a Region with a grade school as the sole source of education. I think Nuclear power is great, it provides a lot of power and takes up a fairly “small” amount of space. The only downside I’ve experienced from them is the large amount of water needed to run them.

 

So what do you think? Am I right? Am I wrong? What’s your favorite source of power and why?

[Yaffle 29]

I start with wind (cheap) and then switch to either oil or coal. The first driver is if I am extracting either, the second simply my mood. They get plopped at the edge of the map downwind of everything else, and I add modules as required. I have never used the clean versions because every city I have has given the processing error and been lost before I've managed to research them.

 

Nuclear is great for power output, but with the disasters it's too much of a risk (there are a few comments on this elsewhere) for me. In sandbox mode, it's nuclear all the way.

[ScottyDoesKnow 8]

I normally use clean oil with a trade depot nearby. Twice the power of coal, small footprint, my biggest city has 2 of em. Haven't really used solar or wind much.

 

Never use nuclear, one disaster hits it and your city is gone forever. Well not forever, but it takes 34 years for the highest level radiation to go down to the second highest level, and the size of the meltdown can cover half the map in highest level and the rest in second highest.

[Vaikin 10]

Depending on what you have in your city, the concentrated solar arrays do a great job. They don't take up a ton of space, they're cheap and provide good amounts of power. This assumes that you aren't running heavy power things(mining, drilling, etc).

[endorken 13]

I think they all have their uses, sort of. Wind is good if your map has high elevation and lets you work those turbines at full power + you can tuck them away in the cliffs where you wouldn't be able to build anything anyway.

 

Oil has the smallest footprint/capacity ratio -- 600MW is nothing to sneeze at and with the uni research project completed, it's not even that much of a polluter.

 

Solar is good, but for larger cities with high electricity needs -- I dunno, it does take up some space and 480MW max, so...

 

Nuclear is fine, but that water consumption is pretty nasty, so ironically the real limitation with nuclear is the amount of sewage you can produce/import.

[MOWS 4 U 169]

NEVER USE NUCLEAR!!!  While it seems like it would be the best the risk of a meltdown isn't worth it and there is no way to prevent it.  I had a meltdown in a city where 90% of people were educated with at least one of EVERY educational building.  Concentrated solar array is your best solution (if you can afford it).  My biggest city only needs 2 of them. My second choice is coal/oil with the moderately polluting modules. Good power output, moderate pollution, and immediately available (no research needed).

[Rhadamant5186 19]

Solar with the concentrators are awesome.

[Griffon 19]

my favorite power plant is oil, it provides the most power for the space it takes up and I usually unlock the clean oil generators at my university so they are good in any city after that, also the clean generators are cheaper then all but wind and solar at the university

 

I tried solar once, it took up 3 blocks of my city fully upgraded then I unlocked other version of it and it only took up 1 block fully upgraded but I was still short on power in that city and I think it was about 8k money per hour cost

 

wind is the worst for room used and power output but good beginning power plant, I've only upgraded it fully for the achivement that gives acess to the tornado, I only use coal in my metals city cause I don't have to import resources to power it but I often need at least 2 fully upgraded to power my city, and I never use nuclear cause I don't want to take the risk of it getting destroyed by disasters, but I'd say they are safer than people say they are, it took me 2 game years to get 1 nuclear meltdown and I was doing everything possible to make that happen, I had no educated sims and even destroyed 1 reactor with a meter to get some radiation around it to make it explode faster

[Treadstone6700 2]

This is an example of where the city sizes really limit your options.  If you want to have a basic solar or wind power plant it takes up a stupid amount of space.  In real life they don't place those types of power plants in the middle of cities either, they put them in giant open spaces along highways.  It's really impossible to realistically implement solar or wind which is really frustrating.

 

I generally resort to using coal or oil with as many advancements as possible.

 

The nuclear plants kick out a ton of power when the research projects are done, but they suck up a ton of water and if your city has any type of traffic jam people stop getting to school and you are at risk for a meltdown.  Ran into that issue a couple times and had to shut down my nuclear plant.

[VMIUJcadet09 250]

I typically use the clean coal plants, as well as geothermal, and microwave (blast from SC2000!). In remote areas/areas that are less desirable I will use nuclear or a normal coal plant.

[Stuart98 98]

Wind is cheap and is a space pig no matter you suit it up with that produces little power.

Solar is more expensive and is a space pig without concentrated arrays, but once you have them, you can produce 30 an array and the arrays take up about as much space as a level one wind turbine.

[Herdervriend 46]

For me, never got a bigger city then 80.000 yet, Wind Power is the way to go. I love it a lot, but yeah I love greem power...And find nuclear/solar way to expensive..

Also when planning the right way, the space the wind power uses isn't that big I find. Certainly not compared to the advantages it has against coal/oil it's worth it.

[Trooth 22]

I usually start my first city as a metals city and plop coal power. My next city will generally have nuclear and I'll trash my coal. Oil is a lot better than coal for larger cities because they provide higher levels of power. I prefer nuke, but like you said you need a lot of water. I never had a melt down, but I never use nuke first, so educated workers are available before I plop it. Wind and solar would be good for small population cities that are not running drilling/mining/electronics operations. I am sure most of us go big city first, but I am planning on some small, low density bedroom communities that are green and happy. They will be the targets for wind and solar.

[Shiphted 4]

My city of 250,000 People i use solar plants and my other city of 30,000 i use wind. Once wind becomes to little i move to solar. Never need to move to coal or oil. I like to keep my approval rating above 90

[Vaikin 10]

For me, never got a bigger city then 80.000 yet, Wind Power is the way to go. I love it a lot, but yeah I love greem power...And find nuclear/solar way to expensive..

Also when planning the right way, the space the wind power uses isn't that big I find. Certainly not compared to the advantages it has against coal/oil it's worth it.

Depending on what you have planned for your city, wind fails hard! if you want any sort of mining/drilling/electronics, you'd have the entire city filled with windmills vs the tiny little corner with 1-2 power plants.