Mountaineer Wind Energy Center is a wind farm

Wind farm

A wind farm is a group of wind turbines in the same location used to produce electric power. A large wind farm may consist of several hundred individual wind turbines, and cover an extended area of hundreds of square miles, but the land between the turbines may be used for agricultural or other...

 on Backbone Mountain

Backbone Mountain

Backbone Mountain is a ridge of the Allegheny Mountains of the central Appalachian Mountain Range. It is situated in the U.S. states of West Virginia and Maryland and forms a portion of the Eastern Continental Divide...

 in Preston

Preston County, West Virginia

As of the census of 2000, there were 29,334 people, 11,544 households, and 8,357 families residing in the county. The population density was 45 people per square mile . There were 13,444 housing units at an average density of 21 per square mile...

 and Tucker

Tucker County, West Virginia

As of the census of 2000, there were 7,321 people, 3,052 households, and 2,121 families residing in the county. The population density was 18 people per square mile . There were 4,634 housing units at an average density of 11 per square mile...

 counties in the U.S. state

U.S. state

A U.S. state is any one of the 50 federated states of the United States of America that share sovereignty with the federal government. Because of this shared sovereignty, an American is a citizen both of the federal entity and of his or her state of domicile. Four states use the official title of...

 of West Virginia

West Virginia

West Virginia is a state in the Appalachian and Southeastern regions of the United States, bordered by Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Ohio to the northwest, Pennsylvania to the northeast and Maryland to the east...

. When it came online in December 2002, Mountaineer was the first wind farm in West Virginia, and the largest east of the Mississippi River

Mississippi River

The Mississippi River is the largest river system in North America. Flowing entirely in the United States, this river rises in western Minnesota and meanders slowly southwards for to the Mississippi River Delta at the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains...

. Mountaineer Wind Energy Center is owned and operated by Florida Power & Light

Florida Power & Light

Florida Power & Light Company, the principal subsidiary of NextEra Energy Inc. , commonly referred to by its initials, FPL, is a Juno Beach, Florida-based power utility which serves roughly 4.4 million customers in Florida. FPL Group holds power generation assets in more than 20 U.S...

. Exelon Generation

Exelon

Exelon Corporation is an electricity generating and distributing company headquartered in the Chase Tower in the Chicago Loop area of Chicago. It was created in October, 2000 by the merger of PECO Energy Company and Unicom, of Philadelphia and Chicago respectively. Unicom owned Commonwealth Edison...

 purchases the power produced by Mountaineer and markets the it across the Mid-Atlantic region through its partnership with Community Energy, Inc., a leading wind energy marketer in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

.

Energy production capacity

Mountaineer Wind Energy Center consists of 44 NEG Micon

NEG Micon

NEG Micon is a former Danish wind turbine manufacturer. It was formed in 1997 as a result of a merger between Nordtank Energy Group and Micon....

 1.5 megawatt (MW) wind turbine

Wind turbine

A wind turbine is a device that converts kinetic energy from the wind into mechanical energy. If the mechanical energy is used to produce electricity, the device may be called a wind generator or wind charger. If the mechanical energy is used to drive machinery, such as for grinding grain or...

s that produce 66 MW of electricity. The average annual capacity factor of Mountaineer is 32 percent. Mountaineer Wind Energy Center generates enough electricity to power approximately 20,000 homes.

Emissions offsets

In 2005, Mountaineer Wind Energy Center offset generation emissions totaling approximately 162,000 tons of carbon dioxide

Carbon dioxide

Carbon dioxide is a naturally occurring chemical compound composed of two oxygen atoms covalently bonded to a single carbon atom...

, nearly 900 tons of sulfur dioxide

Sulfur dioxide

Sulfur dioxide is the chemical compound with the formula . It is released by volcanoes and in various industrial processes. Since coal and petroleum often contain sulfur compounds, their combustion generates sulfur dioxide unless the sulfur compounds are removed before burning the fuel...

, and more than 400 tons of nitrogen oxide

Nitrogen oxide

Nitrogen oxide can refer to a binary compound of oxygen and nitrogen, or a mixture of such compounds:* Nitric oxide, also known as nitrogen monoxide, , nitrogen oxide* Nitrogen dioxide , nitrogen oxide...

.

Energy consumption

In May 2004, an aggregation of municipality and county agencies in Maryland

Maryland

Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...

, led by Montgomery County

Montgomery County, Maryland

Montgomery County is a county in the U.S. state of Maryland, situated just to the north of Washington, D.C., and southwest of the city of Baltimore. It is one of the most affluent counties in the United States, and has the highest percentage of residents over 25 years of age who hold post-graduate...

, signed a contract with Washington Gas

Washington Gas

WGL Holdings, Inc. , is a public utility holding company located in the United States that serves customers in the District of Columbia, Maryland, and Virginia...

 to purchase wind energy to meet five percent of the collective's combined electricity usage. Under the two-year agreement, the group that includes six county agencies, 11 municipalities, and Prince George's County

Prince George's County, Maryland

Prince George's County is a county located in the U.S. state of Maryland, immediately north, east, and south of Washington, DC. As of 2010, it has a population of 863,420 and is the wealthiest African-American majority county in the nation....

, will collectively purchase 38 million kWh of wind energy annually sourced from Mountaineer Wind Energy Center.