Global wind statistics released

Here are a couple of key observations:

The global wind industry added a solid 54.6GW in 2016, bringing the world’s total to 486.7GW. The market was down 14% from 2015 mainly due to a smaller market in China. Chinese installations were an impressive 23,328 MW, but this was less than 2015’s spectacular 30 GW, which was driven by impending feed-in tariff reductions. 

•The top five markets in 2016 were China, US, Germany, India and Brazil.

•US had a strong year with 8,203 MW installed, and has more than 18 GW under construction or in advanced stages of development, a harbinger for a strong market again in 2017. 

•India broke national record with 3,612 MW installed taking the place of 2016’s 4th largest market. 

•Europe had a surprisingly strong year, given the policy uncertainty which plagues the region, posting modest gains with an annual market of 13,926 MW of which the EU-28 contributed 12,491 MW. Germany had another strong year, installing 5,443 MW to bring its total capacity to more than 50 GW, only the third country to reach that milestone. The Netherlands entered the global top 10 in terms of annual market for the first time (this century!), with 887 MW, most of which was offshore.

•Wind development in Latin America was led once again by Brazil with 2,014 MW, passing the 10 GW milestone and ending the year with a total of 10,740 MW. 

•Installations in Asia Pacific region were modest with only Australia adding capacity (140 MW) although there are signs of a strong revival in the Australian market.

•Africa had a quiet, year with only 418 MW installed in South Africa. Elsewhere, Morocco had a successful auction for 800+ MW of wind which will be built out over the coming years, and construction was nearly finished on the Lake Turkana project in Kenya. 

•The Chinese offshore market passed Denmark with its installations of 592MW (total 1,627MW) to achieve 3rd place in the global offshore rankings, after the UK and Germany.