Quantifying local wind farm impacts on land surface temperature: Evidence from airport observations and a preliminary model

Recent studies have indicated a warming trend has occurred in the local areas surrounding wind farms. These studies utilized satellite imagery to measure temperature deviations in areas with a high concentration of wind turbines of the United States. Incorporating numerical results from the full article, our analysis provides evidence for a statistically significant warming trend, particularly during nighttime hours in the summer and winter months. Specifically, during the nighttime, there was a warming of 0.724°C in June, July, and August (JJA) and 0.458°C in December, January, and February (DJF). Conversely, daytime changes were minimal, with a change of −0.037°C in JJA and 0.233°C in DJF. These findings underscore a small warming effect near wind farms, predominantly attributed to turbine-induced mixing. This work provides further evidence for the phenomenon using a novel—short-term though—dataset and the results should be viewed as suggestive rather than definitive.