Current global historical reanalyzes prevent to adequately examine the role of the near-core surface wind structural properties on tropical cyclones climate trends. Here we provide theoretical and observational evidences that they are crucial for the monitoring of integrated kinetic energy. The kinetic energy balance is reduced to a simple rule involving two parameters characterizing the surface wind structure and directly suggested by the governing equations. The theory is uniquely verified with a database of high-resolution ocean surface winds estimated from all-weather spaceborne synthetic aperture radar. Such measurements provide indirect estimates of a multiplicative constant modulating the kinetic energy balance and associated with the system thermodynamics. Consequently, accumulated high-resolution acquisitions of the ocean surface shall allow to better monitor the integrated kinetic energy and provide new means to tackle climatological studies of tropical cyclones destructiveness. Studying the long-term climate trends of tropical cyclones is challenging because the historical data is not always reliable. One particular issue concerns the accurate reporting of surface wind properties near the core of these storms in past and present records. This study uses both theory and high-resolution surface wind observations from satellite radar to highlight the importance of investigating these properties, specifically for monitoring the total energy, which is a measure of a storm destructive potential. Two spatial scales describing the tropical cyclone wind structure are identified and may be efficiently measured thanks to the high-resolution sensor. The storm energy equilibrium is shown to be controlled by these two spatial scales, in both theory and observations. This equilibrium is also influenced by the temperature characteristics of a storm, which are themselves modulated by environmental and climatological conditions. Consequently, future high-resolution observations from the satellite radar should help better understanding the dependence of integrated kinetic energy with space and time. High-resolution spaceborne synthetic aperture radar measurements inform on the tropical cyclone kinetic energy balance The tropical cyclone integrated kinetic energy balance is controlled by the surface wind decay and thermodynamical characteristics Accumulating high-resolution surface wind measurements shall allow to better assess trends in the tropical cyclone destructive potential