plantlevel costs are of course those costs that come most naturally to mind when thinking about the costs of electricity provision the bricks mortar and steel to build the plant the fuel and the manpower to run it are easily comprehensible cost items the nuclear energy agency nea and the international energy agency iea publish a survey of the plantlevel costs in oecd countries every five years in the projected costs of generating electricity see ieanea and ieanea ieanea is currently in preparation while concrete work reveals also a number of difficulties in assessing plantlevel costs eg which discount rate to use to reflect the cost of capital at least the basic concepts are well understood plantlevel costs of production are financial and economic realities that are straightforwardly monetised and integrated into the decisionmaking processes of private and public actors in an interconnected electricity system each plant interacts with all other plants on both physical and economic levels