1. Overview of Wind Turbines

The US Department of Energy reported that 27 percent of all energy capacity additions in 2016 came from wind energy (2016). This is great for our country: gaining clean energy while living sustainably. However, the community of Wilmington is unhappy as they currently face a problem with offshore wind farms. According to Adam Wagner from Star News, development of offshore wind farms has been stalled because of the community’s concern of the effect the wind farms have on tourism (2017). Before we delve into the community’s problem, we will review a general background of wind turbines.


The horizontal-axis turbine (the wind turbine most would imagine) can have 2-3 blades with varying heights depending if it is providing for a single home, building or the electric grid. (Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, n.d.). Figure 1 below shows the different components that function in the turbine.

Figure 1: Diagram of components of a wind turbine (Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, n.d.)

The process begins with wind pushing the blades, then rotating a shaft. The rotating shaft is not fast enough to produce electricity, so a rotor with several gears help speeds up to about 1800 revolutions per minute (rpm). The rotor is connected to the generator; producing electricity from each rotation. The higher the wind turbine, the more wind can be used to generate electricity. The Wilmington community doesn’t like their view from the shore. The next section will go into more understanding of offshore wind turbines and research along with them.