Executive SummaryAs wind power facilities age, project owners are faced with plant end-of-life decisions. This report is intended to inform policymakers and the business community regarding the history, opportunities, and challenges associated with plant end of life actions, in particular, repowering. Specifically, the report details the history of repowering, examines the plant age at which repowering becomes financially attractive, and estimates the incremental market investment and supply chain demand that might result from future U.S. repowering activities.Repowering as defined here includes two types of actions. Full repowering refers to the complete dismantling and replacement of turbine equipment at an existing project site. Partial repowering is defined as installing a new drivetrain and rotor on an existing tower and foundation. Partial repowering allows existing wind power projects to be updated with equipment that increases energy production, reduces machine loads, increases grid service capabilities, and improves project reliability at lower cost and with reduced permitting barriers relative to full repowering and greenfield projects.Repowering first emerged in the early 1990s in the California and Danish wind power markets and was followed by the Dutch and German markets in the 1990s and 2000s. Although repowering activity has occurred elsewhere, these locales remain the principal markets for repowering investments. Historically, repowering has been viewed as a means of increasing project productivity while offering an array of other potential attributes of interest. Fundamentally, however, profitability for a given project is the primary driver of repowering decisions. Given limited financing, the anticipated profitability at alternate greenfield sites is also relevant.Two distinct analyses were conducted to understand the plant age when repowering becomes viable. These analyses utilized NREL's System Advisor Model (SAM), a tool that enables the user to predict estimated cash flows from a variety of electric power generation technologies. Net present value calculations were utilized to enable comparisons across time.The first analysis involved creating "proto-typical" wind plants of four different vintages, with commissioning years of 1999, 2003, 2008, and 2012. Proto-typical plants are representative of the industry at the time of their construction and rely on market data from each of the commissioning years to derive installation and equipment costs, power purchase agreement revenue, net capacity factor, receipt of federal production tax credit payments, and operation and maintenance expenses. For each of these four plants, future investment decisions to repower, or build a nearby greenfield site, were evaluated for 2015, 2020, 2025, and 2030.The second analysis focused on three actual wind plants operating in the United States. These plants were chosen for varying vintages and geographical diversity and include a Northeast wind plant (15-20 years old), a Midwest wind plant (10-15 years old), an...