U.S. Wind Energy Installations Surge: A New Turbine Rises Every 2.4 Hours

The wind power industry just chalked up its strongest first quarter in eight years. Tax credits play an important role.

Every two and a half hours, workers installed a new wind turbine in the United States during the first quarter of 2017, marking the strongest start for the wind industry in eight years, according to a new report by the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) released on May 2.

"We switched on more megawatts in the first quarter than in the first three quarters of last year combined," Tom Kiernan, CEO of AWEA, said in a statement.

Nationwide, wind provided 5.6 percent of all electricity produced in 2016, an amount of electricity generation that has more than doubled since 2010.  Much of the demand for new wind energy generation in recent years has come from Fortune 500 companies including Home Depot, GM, Walmart, and Microsoft that are buying wind energy in large part for its low, stable cost.

Texas leads the states in installed wind energy capacity

The significant increase this past quarter, when 908 new utility-scale turbines came online, is largely a result of the first wave of projects under the renewable energy tax credits that were extended by Congress in 2015, as well as some overflow from the prior round of tax credits. The tax credits' gradual phase-out over a period of five years incentivized developers to begin construction in 2016, and those projects are now beginning to come online.

A recent AWEA-funded report projects continued steady growth for the wind energy industry through 2020.  Energy analysts, however, say that growth could slow after 2020 as the federal Production Tax Credit (PTC) expires.

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