The global movement towards new alternatives to fossil fuels has spawned a wealth of technology innovation, created thousands of new jobs, garnered political incentives, and enlisted millions of people around the world in “going green.” In fact, the U.S. government has made a goal of 20% wind energy reliance by the year 2020.

Modular Wind Energy is proud to be a part of this movement.

Unlike fossil fuels, wind energy doesn’t cause an increase of carbon emissions in the atmosphere and, therefore, doesn’t contribute to climate change. It also causes no air pollution.

A Place to Innovate

For us, it’s not only about utilizing cleaner forms of energy. Wind is also a place where we can innovate. Modular Wind Energy’s experience in aerospace has given us a tremendous advantage in improving the design of rotor blades. The aerospace technologies that we apply to wind power allow us to make a significant impact on the industry’s bottom line – its costs. As we utilize our joint and structural design to create longer, higher quality blades, the costs associated with wind energy continue to fall.

Lowering the Costs

As a new method of energy creation, wind was very expensive ten years ago. In the last two years, however, the cost of wind energy has dropped into the range of 5 to 6 cents per kilowatt-hour, putting it about 2 cents cheaper than coal production. As the price falls, wind energy becomes more prevalent. For example, since 2005, 35% of all new energy production in the United States has come from wind power, which is more than gas and coal plants combined. This decreasing cost has proven that wind is a stable financial bet against unpredictable commodity prices, making it more appealing to Wall Street, investors, and workers.

Avoiding Climate Change

According to a recent study by the (IPCC) International Panel on Climate Change, global emissions need to begin to decline before the year 2020 if we are to avoid the worst consequences of climate change. Wind energy is a significant threat to climate change and a tremendous asset in reducing CO2 emissions in this critical period. Already, over 120 GW of installed wind power capacity in over 70 countries are saving the planet a significant amount of carbon emissions. The Global Wind Energy Council estimates that wind energy is on track to create an annual savings of over 1,500 million tons of CO2 by 2020, rising to 3.5 billion tons by 2030. In cumulative terms, this would mean a total of 10 billion tons of CO2 saved by 2020 and over 30 billion tons by 2030.