Texas’ 7,118 MW is way ahead of the second placed Iowa (2,791 MW), according to the American Wind Energy Association’s (AWEA) annual report.

The AWEA has reported that Texas continues to be the leader among all the states in the U. S. in terms of wind capacity and largest wind farms installed.

The top five states in terms of capacity installed are: Texas, with 7,118 MW; Iowa, with 2,791 MW; California, with 2,517 MW; Minnesota , with 1,754 MW; Washington, with 1,447 MW.

Texas installed the largest amount of new capacity in 2008— 2,671 MW. More new wind capacity was added in Texas during the year than in any country except China and the U.S.

The local media highlighted that despite being the leader, Texas “badly needs expensive transmission lines” to send wind-generated electricity from where most of it is spawned — West Texas and the Panhandle — to where the bulk of it is consumed — big, relentlessly growing metropolitan areas such as Dallas-Fort Worth.

Some of the other highlights from the AWEA annual report were:

Oregon moved into the 1,000-MW club, which now counts seven states, including Texas, Iowa, California, Minnesota, Washington and Colorado.

Indiana ranked as the state with the fastest growth rate, expanding installations from zero to 131 MW, followed by Michigan (48 percent), Utah (21 percent), New Hampshire (17 percent) and Wisconsin (six percent).

Two states – Minnesota and Iowa – now get over seven percent of their electricity needs from wind.

Also, 10 new manufacturing facilities came online, 17 were expanded, and 30 were announced in 2008, according to the AWEA estimates.