"The U.S. wind industry installed 5,944 MW of new wind power capacity in the fourth quarter of 2018, the third-strongest quarter for installations on record. In total, the industry commissioned 7,588 MW of wind power capacity in 2018, an 8% increase over 2017."
-- American Wind Energy Association U.S. Wind Industry Fourth Quarter 2018 Market Report
The share of total U.S. generation from wind is projected to increase from 7% in 2018 to 9% in 2020.
Electricity from wind will surpass hydro as the top renewable energy source in the years to come:
While cost will continue to drop, it will reach a limit to cost reductions. Chief reason for lower costs have been larger turbine sizes, which are quickly reaching the maximum practical limit. There will be other smaller improvements reducing cost. IRENA projects the cost to drop from US $56.0/MW-h to $40 by 2050.
Offshore wind provides opportunities for stronger, more reliable winds, but installation costs make offshore wind more expensive.
Wind does not blow consistently throughout the year. Nationally, wind power drops off during the summer:
Unlike conventional fossil-fueled generators, there is no fuel or other variable cost associated with wind power generation. As a result, a wind plant's capacity factor—a measure of the plant's generation as a percentage of its maximum generating capacity—is very closely related to the available wind resource, or average wind speed. In general, wind plant capacity factors tend to be higher during windier periods of the year.
(see note below for explanation of "capacity factor")
In many regions the energy produced for parts of the year falls below 20% of capacity:
As can be seen, wind energy delivered varies considerably by season and region.
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Note 1: Capacity factor of a power plant is the actual power produced divided by the maximum possible. If the nameplate capacity is 1 megawatt, the potential maximum energy over a year is 24 hours x 365 days = 8760 megawatt-hours. In the case of wind, because of periods of less than optimum wind, or excessive wind, the actual energy delivered to the grid is around 32% of that the maximum or about 2800 Mwh per year in the case of a 1MW wind turbine.
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