Installed capacity is the traditional measuring stick for wind’s expansion, and there was barely any in the first half of this year – a mere 1.6 megawatts added to the approximately 60,000 MW that the industry carried into 2013. Even in this latest quarter, new capacity ticked up a mere 69 MW.

 

But in its just-released third-quarter 2013 report, the American Wind Energy Association pointed to projects totaling 1,100 megawatts that broke ground over the course of the summer, bringing “construction activity” to 2,327 megawatts as of Sept. 30. Texas (539 MW), Michigan (362 MW), Nebraska (275 MW), Washington (267 MW), Kansas (254 MW), California (226 MW) and North Dakota (205 MW) were the leaders.