Wind Energy Models and Tools

A number of tools are available that provide modeling, mapping, and optimization for wind energy applications.

Models

  • System Advisor Model (SAM): Assists with decision-making for people involved in the renewable energy industry through performance and financial modeling. SAM makes performance predictions and cost of energy estimates for grid-connected power projects based on installation and operating costs and system design parameters that the model user specifies.

  • Jobs and Economic Development Impacts (JEDI) Models: Estimates economic impacts from power projects. Models for wind power include distributed wind, utility-scale wind, and offshore wind.

  • Small Wind Economic Model: Allows users to estimate the performance and economics of potential distributed wind turbine projects, with a focus on certified residential turbines.

  • Regional Energy Deployment System Model: Simulates the evolution of the bulk power system, generation and transmission, from present day through 2050 or later.

  • Renewable Energy Potential (reV) Model: Empowers users to calculate renewable energy capacity, generation, and cost based on geospatial intersection with grid infrastructure and land-use characteristics.

  • Distributed Generation Market Demand (dGenTM) Model: Allows users to simulate U.S. customer adoption and use of solar, wind, and storage technologies through 2050 at site-specific, state, and national levels.

Tools

  • Wind Energy Permitting Toolkits: Includes information on how jurisdictions can standardize their zoning regulations and permitting processes to ensure safe and cost-effective wind energy development that is appropriate for their community. Strategies are provided for large-scale wind projects connected to transmission lines and small-scale projects intended for on-site use. This toolkit focuses on local zoning, planning, and permitting issues at the county or municipality level. Developed by the Northwest Wind Resource and Action Center.

  • Energy Zones Mapping Tool: Identifies potential energy resource areas and energy corridors in the United States.

  • Cost of Renewable Energy Spreadsheet Tool: The Cost of Renewable Energy Spreadsheet Tool is an economic cash flow model designed to allow policymakers, regulators, and the renewable energy community to assess project economics, design cost-based incentives, and evaluate the impact of various state and federal support structures.

  • DoD Siting Clearinghouse: Gives users a comprehensive, expedited evaluation of energy projects and their potential effect on Department of Defense (DoD) operations, such as radar. Developers must complete information for the DoD before siting their projects.

  • West-Wide Wind Mapping Project: Maps wind energy resources on public lands and identifies existing land use exclusions and other potential resource sensitivities that may affect wind energy development opportunities.

  • Renewable Energy Integration and Optimization (REopt™) Tool: Identifies and prioritizes renewable energy projects at a single site or across a portfolio of sites in multiple cities, states, or countries, each with its own energy requirements, resources, goals, and constraints. A new distributed wind module in the REopt™ Lite web tool helps building and facility managers better analyze energy demand data, evaluate on-site energy generation and resilience options, and estimate energy generation and storage system costs at commercial properties.

  • RE-Powering’s Electronic Decision Tree: Assesses contaminated lands for solar and wind energy development potential. The Wind Energy Decision Tree, developed by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s RE-Powering America Land Initiative, is a useful tool not only for projects on contaminated lands but also for general siting.

  • Wind Prospector: Helps developers view high-level siting issues with large-scale wind farms by providing easy access to GIS-based wind resource datasets and other data relevant to siting wind power projects. Wind developers gather their own wind speed and other information at project locations throughout the development process.

  • United States Wind Turbine Database: Allows users to discover and learn more about wind turbine sites throughout the United States. This database was jointly funded by the U.S. Department of Energy Wind Energy Technologies Office via the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Electricity Markets and Policy Group, the U.S. Geological Survey Energy Resources Program, and the American Wind Energy Association.

  • State and Local Planning for Energy (SLOPE) Platform: Integrates dozens of distinct sources of energy efficiency, renewable energy, and sustainable transportation data and analyses to enable more data-driven state and local decision making. These data include offshore wind at the state level and land-based wind at the state and county levels.

  • State Statutes on Wind Facility Siting: Provides a searchable database of all state statutes, including links. Developed by the National Conference of State Legislatures.

  • Northeast Ocean Data Portal: Provides user-friendly access to maps, data, tools, and information needed by government entities, non-government organizations, and ocean stakeholders to support ocean planning, management, and decision making from Long Island Sound to the Gulf of Maine. Developed by the Northeast Regional Planning Body.

  • OceanReports: Allows users to draw a custom area anywhere in U.S. waters or pick from a predefined list of locations to get instant custom reports. Reports include infographics and supporting data that can be used for offshore planning, permitting, environmental review, public relations, and more. Created by the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the Department of Commerce’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

  • WindView: Extends the planning capabilities of power system operators and increases their understanding of the dynamics that drive their unique energy systems. Learn more about this wind power forecast visualization tool created by DOE’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory and Argonne National Laboratory, along with the University of Texas-Dallas.