Ingo Wagner / Reuters

Offshore wind turbines are seen in Germany's North Sea, along with a service platform that doubles as a transformer sending electricity to the mainland. Germany and Denmark are leaders in the offshore wind industry.

Placing wind turbines off the East Coast could meet the entire demand for electricity from Florida to Maine, according to engineering experts at Stanford University.

It would require 144,000 offshore turbines standing 270 feet tall — not one of which exists since proposals have stalled due to controversy and costs. But the analysis shows it's doable and where the best locations are, says study co-author Mark Jacobson, a Stanford professor of civil and environmental engineering.

The team is not advocating for an "all wind" approach, saying it'd be foolish to put all of one's energy eggs in a single basket, but they do think it could reach up to 50 percent. Today the U.S. gets about 4 percent of its electricity from wind, but only via turbines on land.

The first large-scale offshore wind farm was proposed in 2001 off Massachusetts' Nantucket Island. But vocal opposition, including from political heavyweights like the Kennedy family, are seeking to block the $2.6 billion Cape Wind project, arguing the 130 massive turbines would mar views and endanger boat and air traffic.

"The question that I would first ask" critics, Jacobson told NBC News, "is would they rather have a coal or natural power gas plant in their neighborhood, which affects their health and that of their children as well as their quality of life and property values, or an innocuous turbine that they could barely see during those times when they were actually looking offshore."

For the analysis published in the journal Wind Energy, Jacobson's team created a computer model with 144,000 wind turbines that produce 5 megawatts of electricity each, similar to the turbines installed off Denmark and Germany. They then plugged in historical wind speed data to come up with estimates.

A. Baseden / AP

Map shows site of proposed wind farm near Cape Cod.

They also favored places with lower hurricane risk, essentially excluding any area south of Virginia.

The best locations are "way out of sight" from coastlines, Jacobson said, and the worst-case scenarios would be distant views of turbines about the size of one's extended thumb.

"The only place with significant opposition to offshore wind that I am aware of has been in Nantucket," he added. "There are dozens of other proposals in the U.S. that have not faced nearly the same extent of opposition."

Cape Wind does have federal approval, as well as support from major national environmental groups, and hopes to begin building turbines next year. But opposition groups like Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound are still battling the project in court and before federal agencies.

Cape Wind

Cape Wind created this simulated photo to show what it says would be the view of its wind farm from Nantucket Island. The distance out to the turbines, seen as white dots on the horizon, is 13 miles.

A further limitation is cost. Cape Wind, for one, is still working on financing, and cheaper natural gas has taken some of the shine off wind, at least in investors' eyes. Moreover, installation offshore currently costs two to three times more than land-based turbines.

Jacobson's team says the new study will help locate the most economically feasible sites, particularly around New York and Boston when peak demand for electricity can send prices soaring.

"Connecting the power to the grid would be technically as easy as laying a cable in the sand and hooking it directly into the grid without the need to build often controversial transmission lines on the land," said Mike Dvorak, the principle author of the study.

He also noted that offshore wind has an advantage over land-based wind turbines.

"People mistakenly think that wind energy is not useful because output from most land-based turbines peaks in the late evening/early morning, when electricity demand is low," Dvorak said. "The real value of offshore wind energy is that it often peaks when we need the most electricity — during the middle of the day."

Besides reducing pollution and increasing domestic energy resources, wind has a key advantage over natural gas or coal, Jacobson notes. That's price stability.

"There's zero fuel costs once they're in the water," he said. "Coal and gas are depletable resources, so their cost will inevitably go up over time. The cost of wind energy will remain stable, and the wind resource is infinite."

More content from NBCNews.com:

• Obama: US has 'profound respect for people of all faiths'
• 'Free money' for Conn. fishermen amid eco-disaster?
• Suspected anti-Islam filmmaker questioned by Feds
• 83-year-old held over hit-and-run crash that killed boy, 6
• 'Half of me died with him': Family seeks answers over death of Fla. businessman
• Americans killed in US consulate attack honored at Andrews
• 'Bucket List Bandit' nabbed in Oklahoma traffic stop
• Women face stubborn wage gap as wages fall for everyone

Follow US News from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook

Ted S. Warren / AP

This Shell drilling rig, upgraded in Seattle, will soon head to Alaska, where Shell hopes to drill exploratory wells in Arctic waters.

Parts of America’s Arctic waters, long a battleground between environmentalists and the energy industry, will be open for oil and natural gas drilling in four years, the Obama administration said Tuesday -- the same day Shell announced it had successfully tested a new spill containment system for its planned Arctic exploration this summer. 

Details will be released Thursday, but Interior Secretary Ken Salazar told reporters the idea is to adopt "targeted leasing" -- opening some areas in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas for drilling while protecting others critical for native subsistence and ecosystem health.

Shell is awaiting the final permits to explore in the region this summer, and on Tuesday said a device to cap any spill was successfully tested in waters off Seattle. "The capping stack was deployed to a depth consistent with the shallow water scenario we will encounter off the coast of Alaska," the oil giant said in a statement.

How the industry prepares for spills has come under greater scrutiny since the 2010 BP oil spill disaster, where the containment system failed.

Environmentalists oppose drilling in America's Arctic due to the sensitive ecosystem it provides for polar bears, walruses, whales and seals. 

Shell

A newly designed "capping stack" is tested by Shell in waters off Seattle, Wash., on Monday.

"There is no viable way to clean up oil spilled into the Arctic Ocean," Kristen Miller of the Alaska Wilderness League said in a statement. "The Arctic is perhaps the most extreme region on the planet with subzero temperatures, hurricane force storms and long periods of darkness. Spill response capacity is practically nonexistent in these remote, icy waters -- the nearest Coast Guard station is more than 1,000 miles away."

Shell is required to have a flotilla of spill response boats should its capping system fail, and Salazar said no commercial drilling would proceed if Interior concludes that spills cannot be contained.

Shell's work "will be conducted under the closest oversight and most rigorous safety standards in the history of the United States," he said from Norway, where he and ministers of other Arctic nations were talking about the region's energy wealth.

Salazar was confident Shell would receive the final permits for exploratory drilling this summer. 

"It is highly likely that the permits will be issued" because Shell has been in compliance so far, he said. In past years, and before strict standards, 30 exploratory wells were drilled in Alaska's Arctic waters with no harm, and before strict standards, Salazar noted. 

Salazar added that other Arctic nations like Canada, Russia and Norway were busy developing Arctic energy fields and that the U.S. should also be a player as long as protections are in place.

"These resources, if developed safely, can be important components in the 'all of the above' energy strategy," he said in a speech at the Norway meeting. The strategy was crafted after Republicans accused President Barack Obama of blocking traditional energy in favor of renewables like solar and wind.

The Arctic areas will be part of Interior's five-year offshore lease plan being sent to Congress on Thursday.

More content from msnbc.com and NBC News:

• Friends reel from shooting of teen lesbian couple in Texas
• NBC exclusive: Matt Sandusky details sex abuse by his father
• Report: Missing oil tycoon's wife had sought divorce
• Video: As burglars break in, calm teen dials 911
• NBC/WSJ poll: More would be pleased if health law ruled unconstitutional

Follow US News on msnbc.com on Twitter and Facebook