The magnitude of the error in "The fallacy at the core of wind power" [MetroWest Daily News, April 28] is stunning. No one seems to understand the relationship between a megawatt and a megawatt-hour.
A 2.5 megawatt turbine could in principle run 8,544 hours per year (24 hours per day times 365 days per year), and produce 21,360 megawatt-hours per year.
Since the wind is only favorable 30 percent of the time, in practice the output would be more like 6,408 megawatt-hours per year.
It is a shame that so much editorial space was devoted to expounding on such a simple yet huge error. And sad that many will see the column and believe that wind power is not viable, when in fact it is a cost-competitive source of power in many locations.