Influence of large-scale wind power on global climate

Author: Keith, David; et al. | Environment, Meteorology

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Abstract – Large-scale use of wind power can alter local and global climate by extracting kinetic energy and altering turbulent transport in the atmospheric boundary layer. We report climate-model simulations that address the possible climatic impacts of wind power at regional to global scales by using two general circulation models and several parameterizations of the interaction of wind turbines with the boundary layer. We find that very large amounts of wind power can produce nonnegligible climatic change at continental scales. Although large-scale effects are observed, wind power has a negligible effect on global-mean surface temperature, and it would deliver enormous global benefits by reducing emissions of CO₂ and air pollutants. Our results may enable a comparison between the climate impacts due to wind power and the reduction in climatic impacts achieved by the substitution of wind for fossil fuels.

David W. Keith, Departments of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering and Economics, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Joseph F. DeCarolis, Department of Engineering and Public Policy, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
David C. Denkenberger, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey
Donald H. Lenschow, Philip J. Rasch, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Princeton University
Sergey L. Malyshev, Stephen Pacala, National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colorado

PNAS: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, November 9, 2004
101 (46) 16115-16120
doi.:10.1073/pnas.0406930101

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