Researchers quantify the wind resource off the Mid-Atlantic coast

I just followed a link from a Dkos diary about the HVAC industry to this Stanford and University of Delaware study which directly measured the wind resources from North Carolina to Massachusetts. They say that, using existing technology, the area can support all of the energy needs for the nine states from MA to NC, with room to grow by 50% - follow the link and read it, very promising stuff!

Here's a few choice quotes:

Willett Kempton, Richard Garvine and Amardeep Dhanju at the University of Delaware and Mark Jacobson and Cristina Archer at Stanford, found that the wind over the Middle Atlantic Bight, the aquatic region from Cape Cod, Mass., to Cape Hatteras, N.C., could produce 330 gigawatts (GW) of average electrical power if thousands of wind turbines were installed off the coast.

The estimated power supply from offshore wind substantially exceeds the region's current energy use, which the scientists estimate at 185 gigawatts, from electricity, gasoline, fuel oil and natural gas sources.

Supplying the region's energy needs with offshore wind power would reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 68 percent and reduce greenhouse gases by 57 percent, according to the study.