The closure of Hunterston B will not cause power network outages, Scotland's energy minister Paul Wheelhouse has insisted.
The nuclear power station is to close by January 2022, according to operator EDF Energy, almost two years earlier than expected.
Last year, Scottish Gas owner Centrica blamed interruption of electricity supply from Hunterston for loss of income.
Wheelhouse reiterated the Scottish Government's position that no new nuclear power stations should be built in Scotland, with energy generated by renewable sources instead.
He said that for a two-month period in 2018, Hunterston B was entirely offline and the Torness nuclear power station in East Lothian was operating at reduced capacity, but it caused no issues for the energy supply.
Wheelhouse told the BBC: "Scotland, in the last year for which we got full statistics, exported a net 15.9 terawatt hours of energy - which dwarfs the output of Hunterston."
When challenged on the use of intermittent power - such as wind or solar, which can see outputs drop as conditions change - and the possibility of importing nuclear power from abroad, Wheelhouse said: "I'm not wanting to underplay the importance of Hunterston in the energy system.
"Nuclear energy does have outages, as I pointed out in 2018, three of the four reactors were out of action and one was only operating at 50% capacity and we still had the lights on.
"It's important not to panic people into suddenly thinking there's going to be a shortage of electricity when there's not."
