Wind

•Total worldwide wind capacity today is approximately 17,000 MW, enough to generate about 34 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity each year. This is about the same amount of electricity that 5 million average California households (containing 12.5 million people) use.

•Wind energy was the world's fastest-growing energy source during most of the 1990s, expanding at annual rates of 25% to 35%. In 2000, about 3,500 MW of new wind capacity (close to a $4 billion investment) was installed around the world, but only 53 MW of that total, or a little more than 1%, was installed in the U.S. However, AWEA expects as much as 2,000 MW of new wind capacity to be installed in the U.S. this year.

•Leading states in terms of installed wind capacity today are California (1,646 MW), Minnesota (272 MW), Iowa (242 MW) and Texas (188 MW).

•U.S. wind potential is enormous. California could conservatively install an estimated 5,000 MW of wind capacity. Other Western states have much larger potential. For example, Wyoming has a capacity ten times greater than California's. The U.S. is, quite literally, a "Saudi Arabia of wind," with vast
resources throughout the Plains states.

- American Wind EnergyAssociation