Thousands of offshore wind turbines are set to rise along the U.S. Atlantic coast, forming the backbone of America’s push toward clean electricity. But these turbines don’t simply harvest the wind — they compete for it.
Each spinning rotor extracts energy from the air and leaves a slower, choppier wake behind it. Researchers have now put hard numbers on how much that invisible rivalry between turbines costs in lost power — and what it could mean for the country’s 2030 offshore wind targets.
When turbines get in each other’s way
Every spinning turbine is essentially a wind thief. It pulls kinetic energy from the air and leaves a slower, more turbulent stream in its wake, meaning turbines positioned downwind receive degraded airflow and generate less power as a result.
It comes from turbines within the same farm interfering with each other — a finding with direct implications for how future farms should be designed and spaced.
This isn’t a new concept — engineers have known about the wake effect for decades. What’s changed is the scale of the problem as the U.S. prepares to build thousands of turbines in close proximity along the Atlantic seaboard.
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