Nuclear and Power Plants

[Aquilon]

Hey guys. I just have a question. After researching both Nuclear Power and Refining, the technology menu shows that I can build Power Plants and Nuclear Plants respectively. Anyways, that's the last I hear of them. They will never appear in my City menus. Anyone know why this is

 

[Prof. Garfield]

Do you have Hover Dam? If so, then only the solar plant will apear as it is the only "better" plant than hydro. By the way, you need a factory in the city before you can build power plants.

 

[Aquilon]

So you're saying Hoover Dam gets rid of Nuclear Plants also? I'm aware of it's effects on Hydro Plants, and I always make sure I get it. But even with Factories, I can never build Power Plants. It'll always be a Manufacturing Plant right after, and then Solar.

 

[Ace]

Hoover Dam acts as a Hydro plant in all of your cities. And since you can only have one of the three(power, hydro, or nuclear) plants in a city, you cannot build any of them if you have Hoover Dam. And Hoover Dam does nothing until you build a factory. You don't always need a Solar Plant, even with a Manufacturing plant. A recycling center should eliminate resource pollution up to about 61 (?not sure if 61 or 62) shields.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

Not that high, but I think that with recycle it eliminates up to around 40 or so. On the topic of polution, is polution more likely to occur if you are on a more dificult level, because in a d+1 game I played, a city had 2 polution triangles and was polluting every turn.

 

[funxus]

I thought it was 52, but I'm probably wrong...

I think Starlifter (on request ) investigated and discovered just about everything there is to know about pollution. Here's the link...

 

[Prof. Garfield]

Thanks for the link! It explains why d+ will give more polution.

 

[Specialist290]

Also, if you have Hoover, you can sell those Power Plants and Nuclear Plants you've already built, since those cities will also benefit from the wonder. This will give you extra production free of charge (relatively), get you some quick cash, and reduce your maintenance fees.

 

[funxus]

Also, if you have Hoover, you can sell those Power Plants and Nuclear Plants you've already built, since those cities will also benefit from the wonder. This will give you extra production free of charge (relatively), get you some quick cash, and reduce your maintenance fees.

I suggest not building powerplants at all though. The impact on pollution can be heavy. While Hoover/Hydro decreases pollution, power plants increases it. This is also why it can be harmful to keep power plants after hoover if you have them built or capture them, not just that they cost and tie up money...

 

[Ace]

62 shields is the cutoff. A recycling center can handle this number. When you go to 63 you need a solar plant to stop all resource pollution.

 

[Ace]

I cannot recall ever seeing a thread on the "most useless city improvement", but if there was one, it would have to be the power plant. As mentioned above, it causes pollution and is followed so closely by hydro, nuke, and Hoover that it is better to wait for one of them.

 

[ElephantU]

I haven't built a Granary or a Police Station in well over a year - excepting the No Wonders game...

For any Power Plant, you have to build a Factory first, then they show on your build list.

 

[TimTheEnchanter]

I cannot recall ever seeing a thread on the "most useless city improvement", but if there was one, it would have to be the power plant. As mentioned above, it causes pollution and is followed so closely by hydro, nuke, and Hoover that it is better to wait for one of them.

I use powerplants all the time in OCC games. They're the cheapest of the bunch, AFAIK, a city can only produce 1 skull/turn so 2 engineers will always be able to keep up with pollution control, you can't always build a hydro in the OCC city because of the terrain restriction (and hoover isn't particularly cost effective!) and I'm probably too cautious because I don't remember what can cause meltdowns, but Nuke plants just scare me.

 

[Ace]

I used to worry about nuke plants too, but I, finally, figured out that as long as you keep your city out of disorder, no problem. Even if a city goes into disorder, as long as you "fix" it immediately, your still ok. But if you do not fix it asap, the effect is just like a nuke device being planted in your city, not good!

Thats a good point about power plants in OCC. Since I have never tried OCC, my knowledge of it is limited to what I have read here.

 

[ElephantU]

If I cannot build Hydro I always go for the Nuke plant in OCC as it is just as cheap as PowerPlant, lower maint cost and reduces Production Pollution like a Hydro. If the situation warrants (Factory already in, and PP will get me to 25 or 50 shields) I will build PowerPlant until I get NP, then sell off and replace. Often I am in a time crunch for things like Offshore Platform or ResLab or trying to pump out another unblocked commodity freight.

 

[TimTheEnchanter]

If I cannot build Hydro I always go for the Nuke plant in OCC as it is just as cheap as PowerPlant, lower maint cost and reduces Production Pollution like a Hydro.

One of these days, maybe I'll learn how to play this game.

 

[la fayette]

Power plants are very useful in scenarios (especially when the scenario doesn't take pollution into account: remember ww2, the scenario that goes with the game).
They are cheap and available early (contrary to HD which is very often in the dirty hands of one of your foes ).

 

[The Last Conformist]

It actually says in the manual tha Nuclear Plants are perfectly safe as long as the city doesn't go into civil disorder ...

 

[Ace]

It actually says in the manual tha Nuclear Plants are perfectly safe as long as the city doesn't go into civil disorder ...

That is correct. As long as the city does not go into disorder, nuclear plants are perfectly safe. I had one melt down on me a long time ago, because I got careless and let a city with a nuclear plant go into disorder and that was all she wrote. It was just like a spy planting a nuclear device.

Nowadays, I never build them because the way I do the advances usually gets me Hoover Dam before I start building factories. That way, you get a 100% boost in shields with no chance of pollution. And if you are using Trade correctly, you are rush-buying most items and only need a few shields to start production.

 

[The Last Conformist]

My point was that the manual, for exception's sake, was both informative and correct on that point.