Abstract
Lake Erie has a significant wind energy resource potential, with extensive areas of moderate water depth and proximity to major cities and industries with substantial electricity demands. The presence of significant numbers of large turbines in wind farms will lead to reduced wind speeds and wind stresses in the wakes within and downwind of the farms. This in turn will affect surface fluxes, currents, and mixing in lake waters, generally allowing increased surface temperatures and reduced summer time mixed‐layer depths. The potential magnitude of these impacts is investigated with a one dimensional application of the Coupled Hydrodynamical‐Ecological Model for Regional and Shelf Seas model for three different water depths using observed meteorological data as input.