Wind Energy 

Wind is a clean, inexhaustible, indigenous energy resource that can generate enough electricity to power millions of homes and businesses. Wind energy is one of the fastest-growing forms of electricity generation in the world.

The United States can currently generate more than 25,000 megawatts (MW) of electricity from wind; enough to power about 7 million American homes. Industry experts predict the US can generate 20% of this nation's energy needs by the year 2030, subject to enhanced transmission infrastructure, streamlined siting and permitting regimes, improved reliability and operability of wind systems, and increased U.S. wind manufacturing capacity.

Wind turbines, like windmills, are mounted on a tower to capture the most energy. At 100 feet (30 meters) or more, they take advantage of the faster and less turbulent wind. Turbines catch the wind's energy with their propeller-like blades. Usually, two or three blades are mounted on a shaft to form a rotor.

When the wind blows, a pocket of low-pressure air forms on the downwind side of the blade. The low-pressure air pocket then pulls the blade toward it, causing the rotor to turn and generate lift. The force of the lift is much stronger than the wind's force against the front side of the blade, which is called drag. The combination of lift and drag causes the rotor to spin like a propeller, and the turning shaft spins a generator to make electricity.

Wind turbines can be used for stand-alone applications, such as water pumping or communications, or they can be connected to a utility power grid and/or combined with a photovoltaic (solar cell) system. For utility-scale (megawatt-sized) sources of wind energy, a large number of wind turbines are usually built close together to form a wind plant.

To make wind energy fully cost competitive, researchers are working to develop larger, more efficient, utility-scale wind turbines for land-based and offshore installations, as well as quieter, more efficient, small wind turbines for distributed applications.

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