Wind power in the United States
The U.S. Department of Energy’s 2008 report "20% Wind Energy by 2030" envisioned that wind power could supply 20% of all U.S. electric power, which included a contribution of 4% to the nation’s total electric power from offshore wind power. In order to achieve this, however, significant advances in cost, performance and reliability are needed, based on a 2011 report from a coalition of researchers from universities, industry, and government, supported by the Atkinson Center for a Sustainable Future. Obtaining 20% from wind requires about 305 GW of wind turbines, an increase of 16 GW/year after 2018, or an average increase of 14.6%/year, and transmission line improvements. Analysts estimate around 25 GW of added US wind power in 2016-18, depending on the Clean Power Plan and PTC extensions. After the current PTC phase-out in 2021, additional wind power capacity is expected to be around 5 GW per year.
In 2015, electric power generation from wind power was 10 percent or more in twelve U.S. states: Colorado, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Minnesota, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, and South Dakota, Vermont, and Texas.
Iowa, South Dakota, and Kansas each had more than 20 percent of their electric power generation come from wind. Twenty states now have more than five percent of their generation coming from wind.
Cost of electricity by source
In 2004, wind energy cost a fifth of what it did in the 1980s, and some expected that downward trend to continue as larger multi-megawatt turbines were mass-produced. capital costs for wind turbines are substantially lower than 2008–2010 but are still above 2002 levels. A 2011 report from the American Wind Energy Association stated, "Wind's costs have dropped over the past two years, in the range of 5 to 6 cents per kilowatt-hour recently... about 2 cents cheaper than coal-fired electricity, and more projects were financed through debt arrangements than tax equity structures last year... winning more mainstream acceptance from Wall Street's banks... Equipment makers can also deliver products in the same year that they are ordered instead of waiting up to three years as was the case in previous cycles... 5,600 MW of new installed capacity is under construction in the United States, more than double the number at this point in 2010. 35% of all new power generation built in the United States since 2005 has come from wind, more than new gas and coal plants combined, as power providers are increasingly enticed to wind as a convenient hedge against unpredictable commodity price moves."