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I have heard that a power plant will produce the same amount of power no matter what amount of electricity is being used. If this is the case, turning off a light bulb would not help reduce the production of green house gases. If you turned many off, I assume the power plant could scale back.

Is any of this true?

Eric Johnson
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  • [Welcome to Skeptics!](http://meta.skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/1505/welcome-to-new-users) It seems to me you answered your own question. Please indicate what the notable claim is that you are skeptical about. – Oddthinking Jan 20 '16 at 05:21
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    "A [load following power plant](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load_following_power_plant), also known as mid-merit, is a power plant that adjusts its power output as demand for electricity fluctuates throughout the day" – user56reinstatemonica8 Jan 20 '16 at 08:50
  • P.s. seems like a good question to me - read it as "It is claimed that reducing power usage (e.g. by turning off light bulbs) reduces fuel usage and is therefore good for the environment. I'm skeptical because the number and size of power plants stays constant for years at a time" – user56reinstatemonica8 Jan 20 '16 at 08:53
  • I was about to answer this, but on second thought it *is* offtopic here. The OP simply doesn't know there's an [energy market](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_market) between consumers, retailers and producers, various market forces make it uneconomical to *store* any extra energy produced. – Sklivvz Jan 20 '16 at 11:21
  • I've heard this claim also, but don't know if there's any notability to it. It seems to completely miss the idea of conservation of energy - if the load drops, but the powerplant continues to produce the same output, then where dies that energy go? – Mark Jan 22 '16 at 01:29
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    See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_Hour for a case study! Coal and nuclear power plants etc can't respond quickly to changes in demand but excess power in the grid can be stored. E.g. Hydro power station turbines can be used as motors to pump water back into the reservoirs to be used later. – Neil Robertson Jan 27 '16 at 12:41

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