The Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC) has released its Global Wind Report: Annual Market Update, showing a maturing industry successfully competing in the marketplace, even against heavily subsidised traditional power generation technologies. More than 52GW of wind power was added in 2017, bringing total installations to 539 GW globally.
Price reductions for both onshore and offshore wind continue to surprise. Markets in Morocco, India, Mexico and Canada range in the area of US$ 0.03/kWh, with a recent Mexican tender coming in with prices well below US$ 0.02/kWh. Meanwhile offshore wind had its first 'subsidy-free' bids in tenders In Germany and the Netherlands, with tenders for nearly 2 GW of new offshore wind capacity receiving no more than the wholesale price of electricity.
GWEC's rolling 5-year forecast puts the 2018 market at a similar level as 2017, as the dominant EU markets in Germany and the UK will face reductions due to changing regulatory environments, and India's market will drop temporarily due to a 'policy gap' between the old and new systems. But the sector will return to growth in 2019 and will pass the 60GW milestone in 2020, and move upwards from there to reach a total of 840GW by 2022.
The US market is projected to remain strong at least through 2020, and probably beyond, and Brazil will continue to dominate Latin American markets, although with a new challenger from Argentina. New markets continue to emerge in Africa and Asia, although China will continue to be the dominant market globally, but with less spectacular growth than in the past decade.
Wind penetration levels continue to increase rapidly. Denmark got 44% of its electricity from wind in 2017, and Uruguay more than 30%. In 2017, wind supplied 11.6% of the EU's power, led by Denmark, Portugal and Ireland at 24% and Spain and Germany just under 20%. Four US states get more than 30% of their electricity from wind, as does the state of South Australia, and a number of states in Germany.
