OK. The latest GE wind turbines generate 3 MW at capacity and their fans sweep about an acre. So they require at least 16 acres each, allowing clearance to swing plus a minimum distance to avoid interference from the turbine next door.

36 GW = 36,000 MW = 12,000 turbines * 16 acres = 250 square miles of wind turbines, an area about half the size of the Las Vegas valley. But, unfortunately, wind turbines only produce, on the average, about 30% of their rated capacity at best, due to wind variation, so we really need more like 800 square miles and 36,000 turbines total if the turbines are to replace baseload. BUT if the wind isn’t blowing, more turbines won’t help. So back to 250 sq. miles.

To be economical, these areas need to be within reasonable transmission distance of the consumers; so let’s say 25 square miles near each of our 10 largest cities. An area five miles square generating 3.6 GW 30% of the time, an incredible eyesore, producing so much noise that people won’t live within two miles of it. (Neither will animals; wind farms in West Virginia report deer and squirrel populations drop to zero within two miles of mountaintop turbines. Raccoons are different; they’ll live wherever they can ransack your garbage and hot-wire your truck for a joyride. They’d live in New York City but they’re afraid of getting mugged.)

So we now have to build a 3.6 GW in the middle of our 5×5 campus to produce power when the wind is calm. We can build a 3-unit nuke, but it’s an incredible hassle to turn it off when the wind blows, so we’ll build a 6-unit natural-gas plant, which we can turn off more or less at will, and could have built on less than 4 square miles (lots less). Our NG plant will provide power 70% of the time while the folks driving by our incredibly huge and expensive wind farm think we’re so wonderful and green. To recover the huge capital costs of a thousand hideously expensive steel-and-concrete towers and even more expensive turbines, not to mention 25 square miles of prime suburban land, the rates we charge our customers will go through the roof, but we’ve got a wonderful corporate image our upper-management can vaunt at wine-and-cheese parties, and the Washington politicians just love us.

Such a deal! And all of this in six years! No wonder Al Gore and his buddies at Goldman-Sachs are drooling over the carbon voucher market!