AWEA's 3rd Quarter Report

This afternoon AWEA held an hour long webinar in which they presented their 3rd Quarter Market Report. The report in its entirety can be found here. Just in case you don't have time to read over the entire report, I thought I would share a couple tidbits of information that I took away from the webinar this afternoon. You can also find a summary of the report in this recent press release.

• Over 1600 MW of wind capacity has been added this quarter with 436 MW of additions in Texas this past quarter. Texas is still number one in total capacity with 8,787 MW.
  
  
• The fastest growth in wind development is being seen in Arizona, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Wyoming and New Mexico.
  
  
• Manufacturing continues to fall behind 2008 levels. Twenty four manufacturing facilities have been built, announced or expanded to date this year. That is in comparison to 36 at this time last year.
  
  
• The grant program that has come out of the ARRA has proved to be a key for unlocking financing for wind developments. Fifteen different projects representing over 1700 MW of wind have received grant money.
  
  
• There is over 300,000 MW of wind development in queues throughout the U.S. This represents general interest in wind developments, from developments that are in early planning stages to projects that are close to being fully operational. Over 63,000 MW of that is in Texas.
  
  
• There are some new names that will be showing up on the top 20 list of developers in the industry when the list comes out at the end of the year.
  
  
• AWEA's focus now is on what they have been referring to as mid-term action (as their immediate action items have been checked off the list); it is to secure the passing of comprehensive legislation that will create a National Renewable Electricity Standard and include national transmission legislation that will upgrade reliability of the grid and also aid in the delivery of more renewable energies from coast to coast.
  
  
• Approximately 50% of the value of wind turbines is being manufactured domestically.
  
  
• Wind development growth in 2010 really depends on legislation that is currently in the works. Many state policies are helping to spur development currently but these need to be replicated on a national level.
  

That's all for now, until next time...