Wind energy has become a mainstream power source in many countries and could meet 12 per cent of global demand by 2020, according to the latest report from the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC) and Greenpeace.

Released earlier this week, the annual Global Wind Energy Outlook predicts that with the right political commitments wind energy could meet 22 per cent of global electricity demand by 2030.

Sven Teske, senior energy expert from Greenpeace International, said the report revealed the global wind energy industry in general and the Chinese wind energy industry in particular had embarked on a period of rapid expansion.

“In 2010, the 600,000 workers of the wind industry put up a new wind turbine every 30 minutes – one in three of those turbines was erected in China,” he said. “By 2030, the market could be three times bigger than today, leading to a €202bn investment. A new turbine every seven minutes – that’s our goal.”

The report was debuted at the Wind Power 2010 conference in Beijing and predicts Chinese-installed wind capacity could top 253GW by 2020 if the state steps up its drive to develop clean energy.

However, a separate report from Chinese Renewable Energy Industries Association (CREIA) offers a slightly more pessimistic outlook, suggesting installed capacity in the country will reach 230GW by 2020.

The association also announced that China overtook the USA for the first time last year in terms of the manufacture and installation of new wind turbines.

“China has just taken the first and easy step in the development of wind power, owning the biggest market and output in the world,” said CREIA president Zhu Junsheng in the report. “To face and address the long-term problems, China needs to learn constantly, create opportunities for international cooperation and communication, and establish a cooperative mechanism of win-win and multilateral wins with wind power corporations and research institutes all over the world.”

With thanks to our friends at Business Green.

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