Energy Business Review
Wind energy is one of the fastest-growing clean sources of electricity in the world. Since wind is one of the most abundantly available and cost-effective energy resources makes it a viable alternative to the fossil fuels.
Furthermore, unlike fossil fuels which are non-renewable and cause pollution, wind farms do not emit any pollutants into the environment during their operation. As wind power generation cost is falling and there is growing clamor to reduce dependency on fossil fuels, development of wind plants are on the upswing.
In its ‘Global Wind Report: Annual Market Update’, the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC) has revealed that the global wind energy market’s cumulative installed capacity has reached 486.8 gigawatts (GW) at the end of 2016. China continues to lead global wind energy market with 168.7 GW of cumulative capacity and 34.7% market share. The US, Germany, India and Spain are the other major markets with 82.2 GW, 50 GW, 28.7 GW and 23.1 GW of cumulative capacity, respectively. In 2016 alone, more than 54 GW of wind power was installed across the globe. GWEC’s five year global wind energy industry market forecast sees cumulative capacity growth rate of 10.4% from 546 GW in 2017 to reach of total of 817 GW by the end of 2021.
