Wind energy curtailment case studies

de S. Fink

Though development of new transmission now appears to be increasing, lack of transmission is currently a primary barrier towards the expansion of wind capacity, in no small part because high-quality wind resources are typically located in areas far from load centers. In addition, wind development can generally proceed much more quickly than new transmission projects, leading to a timing mismatch between wind development and new transmission. Due to these factors, wind curtailment initiatives appear to be on the rise. This paper presents a series of case studies on how wind curtailment is being used by different entities.