More than 38,000 jobs were associated with the development, transportation and construction sectors and over 21,000 were involved with manufacturing. Another 8,800 or so were in asset management and operation.
The trade group did not provide numbers for other jobs in finance and the supply chain in its US Wind Industry Annual Market Report 2015.
Texas led the US states with more than 24,000 wind jobs, with Oklahoma next (7,000+), followed by Iowa (6,000+), Colorado (6,000+) and Kansas (5,000+).
AWEA CEO Tom Kiernan said the jobs boom was one of the major reasons the industry's case was heard with regard to the year-end PTC extension.
"Perhaps the biggest reason our industry’s message fell on receptive ears in Washington and in state capitals is that today wind energy’s economic benefits reach to all corners of America, and politicians are taking notice," said Kiernan.
The US ended 2015 with 73.99GW in operational wind power capacity and more than 48,500 utility-scale turbines online. Installations last year were the third highest for the industry after 13.13GW in 2012 and 10GW in 2009.
In 2015, project investment was $14.7bn, up 73% from $8.5bn in 2014. About 9.4GW of projects were under construction at the end of last year, of which 6.6GW started work in 2015.
NextEra Energy Resources was the top owner of wind project assets at the end of last year with 11.548GW, followed by Iberdrola Renewables (5.645GW), Berkshire Hathaway Energy (5.05GW), EDP Renewables North America (3.62GW) and NRG Energy (2.759GW).
Wind energy was the number one source of new electric generation capacity last year, delivering 41% nationwide. It also provided 4.7% of the nation’s electricity during 2015, up from 4.4% in 2014 and 4.1% in 2013.
Eleven states now produce more than 10% of their generation from wind energy led by Iowa (31.3%), South Dakota (25.5%), Kansas (23.9%) and Oklahoma (18.4%), according to the report. Texas led all states for wind generation with 44.9 million MWh, then Iowa, Oklahoma, California and Kansas.
