Chart of the Day: The Collapse of Wind Power

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

Stuart Staniford points out today that the pace of new wind power installations has cratered in the United States:

We need much more wind power. When wind power goes wrong, it kills the odd bird or maybe the occasional worker. Some people don’t like the look of the towers. But we need power, and wind power doesn’t destabilize the climate, and it doesn’t irradiate hundreds of square miles of farmland. So this collapse in investment is terrible news.

I understand why the US congress and the Obama administration was not able to pass climate change legislation, but it’s a terrible commentary on their energy/environmental policy that they weren’t even able to maintain the pace of growth in wind installation.

What caused this? Wind projects have big capital requirements and long lead times, of course, so this could just be a delayed reaction from the 2008 financial crisis. If anybody out there can offer up a better explanation, I’m all ears.

Fact:

Mother Jones was founded as a nonprofit in 1976 because we knew corporations and billionaires wouldn't fund the type of hard-hitting journalism we set out to do.

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2024 demands.

payment methods

Fact:

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2024 demands.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate