A wind farm or wind park, also called a wind power station or wind power plant, is a group of wind turbines in the same location used to produce electricity. Wind farms vary in size from a small number of turbines to several hundred wind turbines covering an extensive area. Wind farms can be either onshore or offshore.
The United Kingdom is one of the best locations for wind power in the world and is considered to be the best in Europe. By mid-August 2022, the UK had 11,198 wind turbines with a total installed capacity of over 25.5 gigawatts (GW): 14.2 GW of onshore capacity and 11.3 GW of offshore capacity, the sixth largest capacity of any country in 2019. Wind power contributed 24.8% of UK electricity supplied in 2020, having surpassed coal in 2016 and nuclear in 2018. It is the largest source of renewable electricity in the UK. The UK Government has committed to a major expansion of offshore capacity by 2030 which was extended from 40GW to 50GW, with 5GW from floating wind sources in a statement by the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy in 2022.
The London Array is a 175-turbine 630 MW Round 2 offshore wind farm located 20 kilometres (12 mi) off the Kent coast in the outer Thames Estuary in the United Kingdom. It was the largest offshore wind farm in the world until Walney Extension reached full production in September 2018.
The Thanet Wind Farm is an offshore wind farm 7 miles (11 km) off the coast of Thanet district in Kent, England. On commissioning it was the world's largest offshore wind farm. It has a nameplate capacity of 300 MW and it cost £780–900 million (US$1.2–1.4 billion). Thanet is one of fifteen Round 2 wind projects announced by the Crown Estate in January 2004 but the first to be developed. It was officially opened on 23 September 2010, when it overtook Horns Rev 2 as the biggest offshore wind farm in the world. It has since been overtaken by many others.
Greater Gabbard is a 504 MW wind farm, built on sandbanks 23 kilometres (14 mi) off the coast of Suffolk in England at a cost of £1.5 billion. It was completed on 7 September 2012 with all of the Siemens SWT3.6–107 turbines connected. Developed as a joint venture between Airtricity and Fluor, it is now jointly owned by SSE Renewables and Innogy.
Wind power became a significant energy source within South Australia over the first two decades of the 21st century. In 2015, there was an installed capacity of 1,475 MW, which accounted for 34% of electricity production in the state. This accounted for 35% of Australia's installed wind power capacity. In 2021, there was an installed capacity of 2052.95 MW, which accounted for 42.1% of the electricity production in the state in 2020.
Wind power in Scotland is the fastest-growing renewable energy technology, with 9,347 MW of installed wind power capacity as of June 2020. This included 8,366 MW from onshore wind in Scotland and 981 MW of offshore wind generators.
Whitelee Wind Farm is a windfarm on the Eaglesham moor in Scotland. The main visitor centre is located in East Renfrewshire, but the majority of turbines are located in East Ayrshire and South Lanarkshire. It is the largest on-shore wind farm in the United Kingdom with 215 Siemens and Alstom wind turbines and a total capacity of 539 megawatts (MW), with the average of 2.5 MW per turbine. Whitelee was developed and is operated by ScottishPower Renewables, which is part of the Spanish company Iberdrola.
Blyth Offshore Wind Farm was a small coastal wind farm located 0.5 miles (0.80 km) off the coast of Blyth, Northumberland, England.
Great Eppleton Wind Farm is a wind farm near Hetton-le-Hole, England. It is owned and operated by E.ON UK. Constructed in 1997, it was notable for originally consisting of twin-bladed turbines, as most wind turbines have three blades. On 29 September, E.ON announced it would replace these with four new REpower MM92 turbines giving a nameplate capacity of 8.2 MW.
Brechfa Forest West Wind Farm is a wind farm in Brechfa Forest in Carmarthenshire in south west Wales. Construction of the wind farm began in November 2016 and power generation commenced in January 2018.
Crystal Rig Wind Farm is an operational onshore wind farm located on the Lammermuir Hills in the Scottish Borders region of Scotland. When phase 1 was completed in May 2004 it was the largest wind farm in Scotland. As a result of 3 extensions it is currently the 2nd largest wind farm in the UK, in terms of nameplate capacity and one of the top five largest in number of turbines.
Humber Gateway Wind Farm is an offshore wind farm 8 kilometres (5 mi) east of Spurn Point off the coast of North East Lincolnshire, in the North Sea, England; the wind farm is located in water depths around 15 metres (49 ft) and covers an area of approximately 25 square kilometres (9.7 sq mi). The wind farm became operational in June 2015.
Walney Wind Farms are a group of offshore wind farms 9 miles (14 km) west of Walney Island off the coast of Cumbria, in the Irish Sea, England. The group, operated by Ørsted, consists of Walney Phase 1, Phase 2 and the Walney Extension. The extension has a capacity of 659 MW making it the world's second largest offshore wind farm.
REG WindPower is a renewable energy company, in the United Kingdom.
Methil Offshore Wind Turbine is a demonstrator site for experimental offshore wind turbines at Fife Energy Park off the coast of Methil, Fife in Scotland.
Wind power in Michigan is a developing industry. The industrial base from the automotive industry has led to a number of companies producing wind turbine parts in the state. The development of wind farms in the state, however, has lagged behind. In January 2021, there were a total of 1,481 wind turbines in the state with a nameplate capacity of 2,549 MW. The nameplate total exceeded 2,000 MW when Pine River came online in March 2019. Wind provided 4.2% of the state's electricity in 2016.
The East Anglia Array is a proposed series of offshore wind farms located around 30 miles off the east coast of East Anglia, in the North Sea, England. Starting with East Anglia ONE it is being developed in partnership by ScottishPower Renewables and Vattenfall. Up to six individual projects could be set up in the area with a maximum capacity of up to 7.2 GW. The first project, East Anglia ONE at 714 MW, received planning consent in June 2014 and contracts in April 2016. Offshore construction began in 2018 and the project was commissioned in July 2020. It is expected to cost £2.5 billion.
Fraisthorpe Wind Farm is a wind power generating site located in the village of Fraisthorpe in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. The site is just 2 miles (3.2 km) south of Bridlington and 40 miles (64 km) east of York. It was granted full planning permission in early 2015 when the Ministry of Defence dropped their objection to the site. This was despite the apparent vocal opposition by local people and councillors. It started generating electricity in August 2016.
