This is a guest post by Cutler Cleveland. Dr. Cleveland is a Professor at Boston University and has been researching and writing on energy issues for over 20 years. He is Editor-in-Chief of the Encyclopedia of Earth, Editor-in-Chief of the Encyclopedia of Energy, the Dictionary of Energy and the Journal of Ecological Economics. He has particular interest and expertise in the field of net energy analysis.

As the world transitions from fossil based energy systems to a larger portfolio of renewables, the tradeoffs between energy quantity, energy quality and environmental impacts will increasingly need to be compared using meaningful metrics. Wind energy seemingly provides high returns, high quality energy (electricity) with minimal large scale environmental impacts.

The post below the fold is Dr. Cleveland's and Ida Kubiszewski's 2006 meta-analysis on wind, "Energy Return on Investment (EROI) for Wind Energy".**