Wyoming has one of the highest wind power potentials of any state in the United States. In 2019, Wyoming had wind powered electricity generating capacity of 1,589 MW, which produced 9.85% of its electric generation, with an additional 3,753 MW under construction. However, the wind generation in that year was Wyoming's third-lowest in the 2010s.[1] By 2020, wind capacity increased to 2738 MW[2] and 8448 gigawatt-hours of electricity were produced from wind in 2021,[3] more than double 2019 production. Additional wind capacity and needed transmission lines are under construction or planned, despite political headwinds from Wyoming's strong coal and oil sectors.[4]
Wyoming's geography of high-altitude prairies with broad ridges makes the state an ideal site for the development of wind resources. Other factors that positively affect Wyoming's wind power development potential include transmission capabilities,[5] the high energy needs of nearby population centers,[5] high public support of wind power development in the state (97% support),[6] and the historical importance of energy sectors to the state's economy.[7]
Disadvantages to large-scale wind power production include competition from fossil fuels industry, as coal power provided 42.7 TWh (90%)[8] of Wyoming electricity in 2016, compared to 3.8 TWh for wind.[9] Wyoming taxes wind power[10] with $1/MWh which provided the state with $3.8 million in 2015.[8]
The Big Hollow is a wind eroded deflation basin located to the west of Laramie, Wyoming in the United States. It is the second largest wind eroded depression in the world. The Big Hollow is the largest deflation basin in North America.
At the end of 2013 Wyoming had the highest per capita wind power capacity.
The first two wind turbines in Wyoming were constructed in Medicine Bow on September 4, 1982, by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the United States Department of Energy. The wind turbines were the largest in the U.S. The two turbines included the WTS-4 at 391 feet tall, and the MOD-2 at 350 feet tall. Mayor of Medicine Bow Gerald Cook held an event with 500 residents at the construction site and declared September 4 "Wind Turbine Day."[11]
Wyoming's first commercial wind farm was the Foote Creek Rim wind project located near Arlington completed on April 4, 1999. This 85 MW (megawatts) wind project had 69 wind turbines, and it is located in one of the windiest locations in the state. Due to average winds of 25mph in the area, the wind project has a capacity factor of 43% of peak output annually, which is higher than most wind farms. As of 2016, the Foote Creek wind project has 183 turbines with a generating capacity of 134.7 MW.[12]
In 2003, the Wyoming Wind Energy Center began operations. It has 80 turbines with a 144 MW capacity and is located near Evanston in Uinta County.[13]
In 2008, the Glenrock Wind Project outside of Glenrock began operations on top of a reclaimed surface coal mine. PacifiCorp, the owner, "believe[s] this is the first wind facility in the West to recycle land that once provided fossil fuels into one that captures renewable energy." The wind project has 66 turbines that generate up to 99 MW,[14] later up to 158 MW.[4]
Seven Mile Hill and Seven Mile Hill II began operations between Hanna and Medicine Bow. It has 79 turbines with a generating capacity of 118.5 MW.[15] In 2008, Mountain Wind Power, LLC and Mountain Wind Power II, LLC began operations. They have 67 turbines with a 140 MW capacity.[16]
As of 2016, Wyoming had 1,489 megawatts (MW) of wind powered electricity generating capacity, responsible for 9.42% of in-state electricity production.[17] Wyoming produced of 3,800 GWh in 2015,[9] about 9% of the total.[18]
In November 2008, the New York Times reported a land rush in Wyoming in anticipation of future wind power development projects. Citizens and land-owners in Wyoming have formed numerous "wind associations" in the hopes of collectively bargaining for higher compensation for the use of their land in wind power production and transmission projects.[19] Most of these associations are located in the wind-power dense counties of southeastern Wyoming, including Platte, Converse, Goshen and Laramie counties.
In 2010, the High Plains and McFadden Ridge Wind Energy Project near Rock River began operations with 66 turbines. It has a capacity of 99 MW. Three Buttes Windpower, LLC, began operations in Converse County near Glenrock and has 66 turbines with a 99 MW capacity. Casper Wind Farm began operations near Casper in Natrona County and has 11 turbines with a generating capacity of 16.5 MW.[16]
Energy Transportation Inc., headquartered in Casper, is a well-known logistics firm that transports overweight and outsized components used in the wind power industry.[20] The Casper landfill is also a disposal site for windmill blades.[21]
In 2010, Dunalap I began operations near Medicine Bow. It has 74 turbines with 111 MW capacity. The Top of the World Windpower Project began operations in Converse County near Glenrock and has 110 Turbines with a 200 MW capacity.[16]
On November 16, 2016, Microsoft Corp bought 237 MW of wind power from Duke Energy's Happy Jack and Silver Sage wind farms in Wyoming along with Allianz Risk Transfer AG's Bloom Wind Project in Kansas to power a data center located in Cheyenne. This was the largest wind purchase in the history of Microsoft.[22] Between 2011 and 2017, no wind farms were built in Wyoming.[4]
The Chokecherry and Sierra Madre Wind Energy Project[23] is the largest commercial wind generation facility under development in North America. Power Company of Wyoming has applied to the BLM to build approximately 1,000 wind turbines in an area located south of Rawlins, Wyoming, in Carbon County. The project is proposed to generate 2,000 to 3,000 megawatts (MW) of electricity and construction may take 3–4 years with a project life estimate of 30 years.[24]
Wind energy generation
Monthly wind energy generation in Wyoming from 2001 to 2024, measured in thousand megawatt-hours.
Wyoming Wind Generation Monthly Average (2001 - 2024)[25]
Net Generation for Wind Monthly (Thousand Megawatthours)[26]
Wind power in California had initiative and early development during Governor Jerry Brown's first two terms in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The state's wind power capacity has grown by nearly 350% since 2001, when it was less than 1,700 MW. In 2016, wind energy supplied about 6.9% of California's total electricity needs, or enough to power more than 1.3 million households. Most of California's wind generation is found in the Tehachapi area of Kern County, California, with some large projects in Solano, Contra Costa and Riverside counties as well. California is among the states with the largest amount of installed wind power capacity. In recent years, California has lagged behind other states when it comes to the installation of wind power. It was ranked 4th overall for wind power electrical generation at the end of 2016 behind Texas, Iowa, and Oklahoma. As of 2019, California had 5,973 megawatts (MW) of wind power generating capacity installed.
Making up over 62% of the state's generated electricity in 2022, wind power is the largest source of electricity generation in Iowa. In 2020, over 34 billion kWh of electrical energy was generated by wind power. As of 2022, Iowa has over 12,200 megawatts (MW) of installed capacity with over 6,000 wind turbines, ranking second and third in the nation below Texas respectively.
New York has 2,192 MW of installed wind power capacity as of 2022. Most of New York's wind power is located in upstate New York as onshore wind farms. New York has set a goal of developing 9,000 MW of offshore installed wind power capacity by 2035 that will power an estimated 6 million homes. As of October 2022, New York has five offshore wind farms in development with approximately 4,300 MW installed capacity.
As of 2023, the installed capacity for wind power in Minnesota was more than 4500 megawatts (MW). Wind power generated 25 percent of Minnesota’s electricity in 2023, ranking among the top ten states in the United States for wind energy as a share of total electricity generation.
Wind power in Illinois provided nearly 10% of the state's generated electrical power in 2020 powering 1,231,900 homes. At the end of 2020, Illinois had 6,300 megawatts (MW) of wind power installed, ranking fifth among states for installed wind turbine capacity. An additional 1,100 MW of wind power was under construction across the state at the end of 2020.
Wind power in Indiana was limited to a few small water-pumping windmills on farms until 2008 with construction of Indiana's first utility-scale wind power facility, Goodland with a nameplate capacity of 130 MW. As of March of 2024, Indiana had a total of 2,743 MW of wind power capacity installed, ranking it 12th among U.S. states. Wind power was responsible for 4.8% of in-state electricity production in 2016.
In the U.S. state of Pennsylvania, wind power is one of the primary sources of renewable energy, and accounts for over one third of the state's renewable energy production. There are more than 27 wind farms currently operating in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Theoretically, the energetic development of these wind farms could provide power for nearly 350,000 homes, or 1,300 megawatts. A majority of the farms are located in the southwest-central and northeastern regions of the state. Pennsylvania is an East Coast leader in wind energy due to its natural wind resources and governmental incentives brought on by the state. There is a lot of potential for growth within the wind power industry in Pennsylvania and the Northeast. Despite being one of the few landlocked states in the Mid-Atlantic region, Pennsylvania is close to several offshore sites along the coast of the Atlantic Ocean.
In 2016, Arizona had 268 megawatts (MW) of wind powered electricity generating capacity, producing 0.5% of in-state generated electricity.
Alta Wind Energy Center (AWEC), also known as Mojave Wind Farm, is the third largest onshore wind energy project in the world. The Alta Wind Energy Center is a wind farm located in Tehachapi Pass of the Tehachapi Mountains, in Kern County, California. As of 2022, it is the largest wind farm in the United States, with a combined installed capacity of 1,550 MW (2,080,000 hp). The project, being developed near Tehachapi Pass Wind Farm— site of the first large-scale wind farms installed in the U.S. in the 1970s and 1980s—is "a powerful illustration of the growing size and scope of modern wind projects".
The US state of Colorado has vast wind energy resources and the installed electricity capacity and generation from wind power in Colorado has been growing significantly in recent years. The growth has been sustained due to a combination of falling costs, continuing federal incentives, and the state's aggressive renewable portfolio standard that requires 30% of the state's electricity to come from renewable sources by 2020.
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 U.S. State of Oklahoma has high potential capacity for wind power in the western half of the state. In 2021, Oklahoma's installed wind generation capacity was almost 10,500 megawatts, supplying over 40% of the state's generated electricity and 85% of Oklahoma's total generating capacity from all renewable resources.
Wind power in Idaho could generate more energy than the state uses.
As of 2023, wind power was the top source of energy in New Mexico, with approximately 4,400 megawatts (MW) of electricity generating capacity responsible for 38% of electricity produced that year. Wind power in New Mexico has the potential to generate more than all of the electricity consumed in the state.
Wind power in Hawaii is produced by the state's 132 commercial wind turbines, totaling 236 MW in capacity. In 2015, wind turbines produced 6.4% of Hawaii's electricity. In 2012, Hawaii generated 367 million kWh from wind power.
The Chokecherry and Sierra Madre Wind Energy Project is large-scale wind farm currently under construction near Rawlins, Wyoming. If completed as scheduled in 2026, it will likely become the largest wind farm in the United States and one of the largest in the world. Located largely on federal lands, the project is being built in conjunction with the TransWest Express transmission line to supply power to California. Originally slated for completion in 2020, the finish date was extended to 2026 in 2019 amid permitting, environmental, and construction delays.
TB Flats I & II Wind Farm is a 301.1-megawatt onshore wind farm located in Carbon County and Albany County, Wyoming, United States. The project was developed by Invenergy and later transferred to PacifiCorp as part of their Energy Vision 2020 initiative. It comprises 132 turbines manufactured by Vestas, specifically the V110-2.0 MW and V136-4.3 MW models.
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