Reduced wind speeds and storm surges mean reduced losses of life, property, and resources. After all, these wind turbines are built to generate power, and the hurricane-dampening effect would be a pleasant side-effect. With the possibility that anthropogenic global warming is increasing the frequency and/or intensity of hurricanes (a still-ambiguous issue), this seems like a good thing. The net cost of turbine arrays (capital plus operation cost less cost reduction from electricity generation and from health, climate, and hurricane damage avoidance) is estimated to be less than today’s fossil fuel electricity generation net cost in these regions and less than the net cost of sea walls used solely to avoid storm surge damage. The reduction in wind speed due to large arrays increases the probability of survival of even present turbine designs. From the abstract: Benefits occur whether turbine arrays are placed immediately upstream of a city or along an expanse of coastline. Stanford University Civil Engineering professor Mark Jacobson (and team) have published an article in Nature Climate Change showing that a large cluster of offshore wind turbines - about 300+ GW worth - could significantly reduce the wind speeds and storm surges from hurricanes.
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