An expanded rebuild of the classic rensmart.com Betz's Law calculator — which returns a single instantaneous power value from swept area, wind speed, and temperature at the theoretical Betz limit (59.3%). This version adds cut-in, rated, and cut-out wind speeds, an adjustable real-world power coefficient, and a full power curve.
Scale the single turbine above into a full farm — enter a turbine count to see total capacity, farm size class, and roughly how much land or sea space that many turbines would need.
Capture kinetic energy from moving air and convert it to rotational torque. Most utility turbines use three, balancing aerodynamic efficiency, structural cost, and smooth torque delivery.
Connects the blades to the low-speed shaft. On modern turbines it also houses the pitch mechanism that angles each blade to control power and protect the turbine in high winds.
The housing atop the tower containing the gearbox, generator, and control electronics that convert rotor rotation into electricity. It can yaw to keep the rotor facing the wind.
Elevates the rotor into faster, steadier wind found at height. Typically tubular steel — its height is often close to the rotor diameter itself.
Anchors the tower to the ground (onshore) or seabed (offshore). Floating offshore designs use a moored platform instead of a fixed foundation, enabling siting in deeper water.
Blades rotate around a horizontal axis facing into the wind, mounted on a tall tower. The dominant design at utility scale — used by both Mersey River Wind and Nova East Wind.
Blades rotate around a vertical axis, so the turbine doesn't need to face the wind directly. Less common at utility scale due to lower aerodynamic efficiency; sometimes used in turbulent or urban settings.
Land-based, fixed concrete foundations. Lower installation and maintenance cost — the approach used by Mersey River Wind's 33-turbine, 148.5 MW project near Liverpool, NS.
Mounted on a floating platform anchored by mooring lines rather than a fixed foundation, enabling siting in deeper water with stronger, steadier wind — the approach proposed for the 300–400 MW Nova East Wind project off Goldboro, NS.
Canada's Clean Electricity Regulations target a non-emitting grid, phasing in through 2035–2050 as part of the legislated net-zero commitment. Wind generation hit a record 50.5 TWh in 2025 — up 10% year over year — and, combined with solar, reached its largest-ever share of total generation.
Not exhaustive — Canada has 300+ operating wind farms. These are each province's largest as a representative sample.
Canada's largest single-phase wind farm, 83 turbines west of Lomond built by Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, delivering first power to the Alberta grid in 2024.
buffaloplainswindfarm.com →A multi-phase complex on the Séminaire de Québec's Côte-de-Beaupré lands, co-owned by Boralex and Énergir — one of the largest wind sites in Canada.
seigneuriedebeaupre.com →Canada's largest First Nation wind partnership, jointly owned by Pattern Energy and Nigig Power Corporation (Henvey Inlet First Nation) on Georgian Bay.
patternenergy.com →Saskatchewan's largest wind farm, 50 turbines near Assiniboia developed by Potentia Renewables, powering roughly 100,000 homes.
potentiarenewables.com →BC's largest wind facility, on Treaty 8 territory near Tumbler Ridge and Chetwynd, operated by Pattern Energy since 2017.
patternenergy.com →A community-initiated project in the Rural Municipality of Montcalm, operating since 2011 and owned by Pattern Energy.
patternenergy.com →New Brunswick's first wind farm, built in three phases near Prosser Brook by TransAlta with power sold to NB Power.
nbpower.com →PEI's largest wind farm, 55 turbines near O'Leary built by Engie (formerly GDF Suez), with most output exported via New Brunswick.
bullfrogpower.com →Nova Scotia's largest wind farm, 34 turbines in Lunenburg County co-owned by Oxford Frozen Foods, Minas Basin Pulp and Power, and Nova Scotia Power.
southcanoewind.com →One of two operating wind farms on the Avalon Peninsula, 9 turbines near Fermeuse owned and operated by Elemental Energy.
elementalenergy.ca →Under construction near Milton, NS — 33 turbines developed by Roswall Development. Its retail arm, Renewall Energy, plans to sell power directly to customers, bypassing Nova Scotia Power. First turbines targeted for late 2026.
merseywind.ca →A proposed floating offshore wind project off Goldboro, NS — roughly 20–25 turbines at ~15 MW each, targeting commissioning around 2030. Not yet under construction.
novaeastwind.ca →Now under construction in Quebec's Côte-de-Beaupré / Charlevoix region — a Boralex, Énergir, and Hydro-Québec joint project billed as Canada's largest wind energy development to date.
boralex.com →P = 0.5 × Cp × ρ × A × v³ — power output scales with air density (ρ), swept area (A), and the cube of wind speed (v). Cp is the power coefficient; the Betz limit caps Cp at 16/27 ≈ 0.593 — no turbine can extract more than 59.3% of the wind's kinetic energy, since some airflow must pass through to avoid stalling the rotor.
A = π × (D/2)² — the disc traced by the rotating blades, from rotor diameter D.
ρ = P / (R × T) — P is atmospheric pressure (101,325 Pa, sea level), R is the specific gas constant for dry air (287.05 J/kg·K), T is absolute temperature (K). Colder air is denser and carries more energy at the same wind speed.
V_hub = V_ref × (H_hub / H_ref)^α — extrapolates wind speed from a 10 m reference height up to hub height. α (the shear exponent) depends on terrain roughness: lower over smooth surfaces like open water, higher over rough terrain like forest or urban areas that create more ground friction and turbulence.
Below cut-in: no output. Between cut-in and rated: output follows the cubic power equation. Above rated: blade pitch holds output flat at rated power. Above cut-out: turbine shuts down for safety.
Cp is held fixed across all wind speeds. Real turbines have a Cp curve that varies with tip-speed ratio and blade pitch, peaking near rated speed and falling off elsewhere.
Air density assumes constant sea-level pressure. Elevation and humidity both shift real air density, which this model doesn't account for.
The power-law α is a single static value per terrain class. Real shear varies with atmospheric stability, time of day, and season — this is a directional estimate, not a site-specific wind resource assessment.
Switching onshore/offshore resets α to a typical default and swaps the visual ground/water, but doesn't independently verify site conditions — always adjustable via the terrain dropdown.