Industry Reference Data

Reactor lifecycle milestones, construction speed records, thermal efficiency rankings, and containment type distribution.

Recent Breaker-to-Breaker Achievements

Plants completing a full continuous operating cycle (Breaker-to-Breaker) in recent outage seasons. [View Full B2B Registry]

Spring 2026 16 units

Fall 2025 11 units

Spring 2025 15 units

Fall 2024 15 units

B2B Champions

Units that have banked a qualifying B2B run and have not tripped since. The title is held through planned refuels and lost only on a scram or forced outage. [Full Leaderboard]

33 current champions across the fleet

Industry Average Capacity Factor by Year

Fleet-wide average capacity factor calculated from NRC daily reactor power data. Excludes decommissioned units after shutdown.

Latest (2025): 91.38% 13 years at or above 90%
The US nuclear fleet's average capacity factor reached 91.4% in 2025 and has held at or above 90% in 13 of the 27 years on record, peaking at 92.1% in 2019.

Nuclear vs Other Energy Sources

Average capacity factors by energy source (EIA data, approximate industry averages). Nuclear consistently leads all major generation sources.

At about 91% capacity factor, nuclear runs closer to full output than any other major source, well ahead of natural gas at 57% and roughly double coal, wind, and solar.

Breaker-to-Breaker Runs

Most vs Least successful continuous operating cycles [Full List]

Most B2B Runs
Least B2B Runs

Construction Speed

Construction Permit to Operating License
Fastest
Slowest
Construction Permit to Commercial Operation
Fastest
Slowest
Operating License to Commercial Operation
Fastest
Slowest

Analysis by Date

Construction Permit Issued
Earliest
Most Recent
Operating License Issued
Earliest
Most Recent
Commercial Operation Began
Earliest
Most Recent
License Expiration
Earliest
Most Recent

Thermal Efficiency

Net Electrical Output (MWe) / Licensed Thermal Power (MWt)

Top 5 Efficient Performers
Lowest Efficiency

Operating Reactor Containment Types

The operating US fleet spans 100 reactors across 7 containment designs. 67 are pressurized-water reactors and 33 are boiling-water reactors.
Notes:
1. Data Sources: Power generation data sourced from U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Daily Status Reports. Lifecycle and technical data from NRC and EIA records.
2. Capacity Factor: Calculated as (Net Generation / Net Capacity), where Net Generation is derived from daily power levels. Excludes units after their official decommissioning date.
3. B2B Runs: "Breaker-to-Breaker" refers to a continuous operating cycle between refueling outages with zero breaker trips (0% power) in between.
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