— Major upgrades to the transmission infrastructure and a sizable chunk
of cash from private investors and the government are necessary for the
Midwest and
The federal lab, part of the
released its Eastern Wind Integration and Transmission Study after more
than two years of analyzing the economic, operational and technical
implications of different scenarios. The research focused on shifting
20 percent of the electrical load from the Eastern Interconnection, one
of the country’s two major power grids, using land-based wind from the
Midwest, offshore wind from the East and a variety of other
combinations.
Although reaching the goal and even stretching to 30
percent is technically feasible, the process will be less expensive and
more reliable if the source wind is drawn from a large geographic area
and if transmission lines are updated and expanded, according to the
report.
To make the power accessible, billions of dollars
would have to be funneled into tens of thousands of miles of power
lines land and sea towers.
And without a price on carbon, greenhouse gas
emissions will drop just 5 percent from the 1.9 billion metric tons of
2008, compared with the 33 percent plunge in emissions associated with
a
The study was initiated in 2008, back when the
country’s total installed capacity of wind generation had just
surpassed 25 gigawatts and was preparing for another 4.5 gigawatts in
the first half of 2009. The report was prepared by
—
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