New wind potential estimates for the lower 48 states based on windNavigator, AWS Truewind’s high-resolution wind resource dataset have been released. The estimates were produced in collaboration with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and they mark the first comprehensive state-level assessment of the onshore wind resource potential since 1993.
Using AWS’ capacity factor maps, NREL estimated the potential wind plant rated capacity in megawatts for each state in various capacity factor ranges.
The increase in the potential estimates for the 80-m and 100-m heights compared to the 50-m height of previous estimates is significant.