A solar power park in Nesquehoning, about 80 miles northwest of Philadelphia cost roughly $120 million to build and is the second largest of its kind in the nation. Over 100,000 solar panels provide power for 3,000 homes. Greek company HelioSphera US also constructed a $500 million plant in Philadelphia that is expected open in late 2011 and will manufacture as many as 1.2 million solar panels annually.
A former steel plant in Brownsfield, west of Philadelphia, has been transformed into a wind turbine manufacturing facility. The plant manufactures two turbines per day, which creates a potential generating capacity of 700 megawatts of wind energy annually---enough to power 200,000 homes for a year. Feasibility studies have also shown that offshore wind farms are viable for areas near Philadelphia.
New York's East River is a short distance from Philadelphia, but proposals to generate electricity from that river would affect the City of Brotherly Love, as well. The plan calls for 30 turbines to be placed beneath the surface of the river. The structures would utilize the natural current of the water and the movement of the tides to create electricity for the national grid.
Pennsylvania is well-acquainted with nuclear power and has the second-highest nuclear capacity in America. Roughly 21 percent of the state's total power generation is nuclear. The Limerick Generating Station, for example, located about 20 miles northwest of Philadelphia, is one of six nuclear power plants currently operating in Pennsylvania. The plant first started operating in 1984 and now produces 2,345 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 2 million American homes.
