LCOE Calculator: Levelized Cost of Energy per kWh
LCOE — the levelized cost of energy — is the single most useful number for comparing the true lifetime cost of different power sources. It rolls capital investment, operating costs, fuel, financing, and output degradation into one cost per kilowatt-hour, discounted to present value. That's why a solar project and a gas plant can be compared directly even though their cost structures are completely different: solar has high upfront capital and zero fuel cost; gas has lower capital but ongoing fuel expense. LCOE puts both on the same footing. One important caveat: LCOE doesn't capture everything. It tells you the average cost per MWh over a project's life, but it ignores when that power is produced. A solar project with $30/MWh LCOE only generates during daylight hours — which is why storage, dispatchability, and grid value still matter enormously in real project economics. LCOE is the right starting point, but not the final word.
Utility solar ~$900–1,200/kW; wind ~$1,200–1,600/kW; CCGT gas ~$800–1,100/kW.
Utility solar ~$15–20/kW-yr; wind ~$40–50/kW-yr; gas CCGT ~$10–15/kW-yr.
Solar and wind: $0. Natural gas CCGT: ~$25–40/MWh depending on gas price and heat rate.
levelized cost of energy
$0.05/kWh
219,000 MWh/yr at 25% CF
$110M total capital
fuel: 0.0% of LCOE
Results update live as you type. For planning and field-check estimates — always verify against applicable standards and equipment ratings.
How we calculate this →How LCOE is calculated: discounted lifetime cost per unit of energy
LCOE uses discounted cash flow to put all costs — upfront and ongoing — on a common present-value basis, then divides by discounted energy output.
The first step converts capital cost to a total: $/kW × MW × 1,000. For a 100 MW solar project at $1,100/kW, that's $110 million upfront. This is not discounted — it's paid at the start.
For each year t from 1 to the project lifetime, the calculation tracks energy output (declining slightly each year by the degradation rate) and annual costs (O&M plus fuel). Both are discounted to present value by dividing by (1 + discount rate)^t. A dollar of cost in year 20 is worth far less than a dollar today; the discount rate captures that.
LCOE = (total capital + sum of discounted annual costs) ÷ (sum of discounted annual energy in MWh). The result is $/MWh — divide by 1,000 for $/kWh or multiply by 0.1 for cents/kWh.
The discount rate is the single most sensitive input after capacity factor. At 7%, a 25-year project's costs in years 20–25 contribute very little to LCOE. At 3%, future costs matter much more. This is why low-cost financing — green bonds, utility balance sheets, government-backed loans — can meaningfully reduce LCOE for capital-intensive projects like solar and nuclear, where most of the cost is upfront.
The cost breakdown shows what's driving your LCOE. Solar and wind are almost entirely capital — 85–95% capital share is typical, because there's no fuel and O&M is modest. A gas plant inverts that: lower capital share but significant ongoing fuel cost that varies with gas prices.