WASHINGTON, D.C. – Rhode Island led the nation in offshore and distributed wind in 2016, according to three wind-market reports released Aug. 8 by the Department of Energy.
Among the findings from the 2016 Distributed Wind Market Report by the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, the Ocean State led the nation in annual distributed wind-power capacity additions, with 15 megawatts of newly added turbines in 2016, bringing the state’s total to 24.1 MW of distributed wind installed between 2003 and 2016.
According to the 2016 Wind Technologies Market Report by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Rhode Island installed 45 MW of utility-scale wind capacity in 2016, the same year state legislators approved an increase of the state’s Renewable Energy Standard from 14.5 percent by 2019 to 38.5 percent by 2035.
The Energy Department also highlighted Deepwater Wind LLC’s December 2016 completion of its 30-MW Block Island Wind Farm as the first commercial offshore wind project in the U.S.
