Jim, can you tell us about how time of day affects wind intensity in offshore projects in the east? One of the critical problems I see wrt wind in the midwest is the time of day problem. That is, the wind blows mainly at night, and much less during the day.

Thanks! It's good to know that Atlantic offshore wind will be there during the peak hours of the year, unlike in the midwest. There, the conditional capacity factor during the midsummer midday is 11%. I wish that there were more information out there on this. The only ISO that publishes good data (that I have found, anyway) is IESO, Ontario.

I have also found a very interesting time map of capacity factor for a specific wind farm in South Dakota (WAUE market). The x-axis shows hour of day while the y-axis shows month of year. The cf is then shown by color. It clearly illustrates that wind is best overnight, especially in the spring and fall, and worst during the midday, midsummer. This is the exact opposite of load and price.

There is not a lot of need for de-salinization plants in the US northeast.