"In a number of European nations, offshore wind farms are well established. However, in the United States, the concept is relatively new and an established approval process for offshore wind farm permitting does not yet exist. This document identifies the approval process one would need to take in order to site an offshore wind farm in coastal waters of the U.S., particularly North Carolina."

Editor's Note: The U.S. Minerals Management Service, a branch of the Interior Department, has review responsibility for offshore projects per the 2005 Energy Policy Act passed in May 2005.

This paper provides an assessment of wind power effects on technical and economic performance of today’s electric power systems. While small penetration of wind power is unlikely to cause any qualitative changes, significant percent of wind-generated power will require major rethinking of generation dispatch and automatic generation control, in particular. We summarize technical risks, as well as the economic implications on total cost of providing power to customers. The discussion is presented for both traditional fully regulated utilities and for the portions of the electric power interconnection which are undergoing restructuring. The paper suggests that the ultimate benefit of wind power to the customers will depend to a large extent on how well are today’s operating practices adjusted to make the most out of the available resources, including the intermittent wind power. Moreover, we suggest that an analysis could be done to determine the amount of wind power for a given system beyond which benefits are difficult to capture because of the necessary additional infrastructure cost.

Wind advocates like to say "The wind's always blowing somewhere" to counter concerns about the variability of wind power. This is true, and it means that wind can always be relied on to produce some power, but that does not mean that wind can always meet demand. In the United States' Great Plains wind belt, wind is typically anticorrelated with demand.