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Data & Web Services

The United States Wind Turbine Database (USWTDB) provides the locations of land-based and offshore wind turbines in the United States, corresponding wind project information, and turbine technical specifications. Wind turbine records are collected and compiled from various public and private sources, digitized and position-verified from aerial imagery, and quality checked. The USWTDB is available for download in a variety of tabular and geospatial file formats, to meet a range of user/software needs. Cached and dynamic web services are available for users that wish to access the USWTDB as a Representational State Transfer Services (RESTful) web service.

About the USWTDB
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory American Clean Power Association

Raw Data & Metadata Downloads

The USWTDB is available in a variety of downloadable file formats, in order to meet a range of user needs. Legacy versions of the database can be found here. The following file formats and associated metadata files include:

  • GIS Data: Shapefile format (~7 MB zipped) | GeoJSON format (~2 MB zipped). The shapefile format is a popular geospatial vector data format compatible with a variety of GIS software. A shapefile stores non-topological geometry and attribute information for the spatial features in a data set. The geometry for a feature is stored as a shape comprising a set of vector coordinates. It is a (mostly) open specification for data interoperability among GIS software products. GeoJSON is an open standard format designed for representing simple geographical features, along with their non-spatial attributes. It is based on JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) and plays an important role in many spatial databases, web APIs, and open data platforms. Learn more about the GeoJSON format.
  • Tabular Data: CSV format (~2 MB zipped). The CSV (comma-separated values) format is common non-proprietary format for storing tabular data stored as plain text.
  • Metadata: XML format (117 KB). Metadata is the background information which describes the content, quality, condition, and other appropriate characteristics of the data. Users are encouraged to download the metadata file for detailed information about the USWTDB. Note that XML files can be read in any text editor.

Variable definitions for the CSV file can be found here, and a full codebook (data dictionary) here.

Geospatial Web Services

For the majority of users, the USGS Energy Resources Program has designed a dedicated USWTDB Viewer for visualization, analysis and dissemination of the USWTDB product. However, users who wish to consume the USWTDB web service can do so by using the RESTful service endpoints below. USWTDB web services can be consumed by GIS applications that support ArcGIS map services or OGC Web Map Service (WMS) specifications.

  • Cached USWTDB Service: Cached map services use a set of pre-created images to quickly serve maps over the web or via applications that support map services. When viewing a cached service, users will be viewing static pictures of the USWTDB and will be limited in dynamic functionality like filtering and data-driven styling. The USWTDB cached map service allows find, identify, and query tasks to reach the underlying data.
  • Dynamic USWTDB Service: Dynamic map services are drawn at the time they are requested by a user. They are not as fast as cached maps, but have built-in capabilities that allow clients to dynamically change the layer's behavior and appearance.

Computational Notebooks

Researchers commonly use computational notebooks to share live code, equations, computational output, visualizations, and explanatory text in a single document. Notebooks provide an environment in which users execute code, examine results, modify, and repeat in an iterative fashion between the user and data. Jupyter Notebooks have emerged in recent years as a de facto open-source standard, allowing researchers to supplement their code and data with analysis, hypothesis, and conjecture. See some examples of using the USWTDB API in a Jupyter notebook, or view a snapshot of the example notebook in a web browser.

Citing the Dataset

The suggested citation for the U.S. Wind Turbine Database is as follows:
Hoen, B.D., Diffendorfer, J.E., Rand, J.T., Kramer, L.A., Garrity, C.P., and Hunt, H.E., 2018, United States Wind Turbine Database v6.1 (November 28, 2023): U.S. Geological Survey, American Clean Power Association, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/F7TX3DN0.

Methods

The USWTDB combines a 2014 USGS data set (48,956 wind turbines, including decommissioned and duplicate turbines) with a 2017 LBNL data set (43,827 wind turbines) and includes regular updates from ACP's WindIQ as well as the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Digital Obstacle File (DOF) and Obstacle Evaluation Airport Airspace Analysis (OE-AAA). The USWTDB is updated as frequently as quarterly as new data become available and will lag installations by approximately one quarter.

All turbine points in the data set are visually verified using high-resolution aerial imagery in ESRI ArcGIS Desktop, and X/Y locations are manually moved to the base of the turbine with an estimated locational tolerance of 10 meters. Visual verification also enables identification and removal of duplicate turbine points and decommissioned turbines from the database, although some decommissioned turbines likely have not yet been identified and thus remain in the data set. Moreover, because of a lag in obtaining up-to-date aerial imagery, some turbine locations have not been visually verified.

Technical specifications for turbines are assigned based on turbine make and model as described in literature, specifications listed in the FAA DOF, and collected via ACP, LBNL, and turbine manufacturer websites. Because some make and model information does not exist or is difficult to obtain, uncertainty may exist for certain turbine specifications.

The uncertainties associated with location and attribute data quality are rated, and a confidence level is recorded. None of the data in the USWTDB are field verified.

Related Publications

The legacy version of the USGS wind project database was updated through 2014 and is incorporated into the USWTDB.

ACP releases quarterly reports tracking utility-scale U.S. wind turbine installations.

The U.S. Department of Energy publishes several annual Wind Market Reports. These include reports on U.S. utility-scale wind projects—analyzing technology, cost, price, and performance trends along with broader industry developments and policy and market drivers—as well as reports on the offshore wind and distributed wind markets.

Diffendorfer, J.E., Kramer, L.A., Ancona, Z.H., and Garrity, C.P., 2015, Onshore industrial wind turbine locations for the United States up to March 2014, Scientific Data 2: 150060, http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/sdata.2015.60.

Diffendorfer, J.E., Compton, R.W., Kramer, L.A., Ancona, Z.H., and Norton, Donna, 2015, Onshore industrial wind turbine locations for the United States to March 2014: U.S. Geological Survey data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/F7251G8Q.

Diffendorfer, J.E., Compton, Roger, Kramer, L.A., Ancona, Zach, and Norton, Donna, 2014, Onshore industrial wind turbine locations for the United States through July 2013: U.S. Geological Survey data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/F7X06561.

Federal Aviation Administration, Digital Obstacles File, in Terrain and Obstacles Data (TOD) Team—Digital Obstacles File (DOF): Federal Aviation Administration, https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/flight_info/aeronav/digital_products/dof/.

Federal Aviation Administration, Obstruction Evaluation Case Information, Obstruction Evaluation/Airport Airspace Analysis (OE/AAA) team, https://oeaaa.faa.gov/oeaaa/external/public/publicAction.jsp?action=showCaseDownloadForm.

Rand, J.T., Kramer, L.A., Garrity, C.P. et al. A continuously updated, geospatially rectified database of utility-scale wind turbines in the United States. Sci Data 7, 15 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-020-0353-6.

U.S. Energy Information Administration, Form EIA-860 detailed data, in Electricity: U.S. Energy Information Administration, http://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/eia860/.