The Global Wind Energy Council’s latest forecast predicts that the world’s wind energy capacity will nearly triple in the next five years, led by tremendous growth in China, and steady expansion in Europe and North America.

The GWEC predicts that in 2013, global wind generating capacity will stand at 332 gigawatts, up from 120 GW at the end of 2008. The year-on-year growth rates during this period will average 22%, which is modest compared to an average increase of 28% over the last 10 years.

The group notes that in the past its’ projections have regularly been outstripped by the actual performance of the sector and have had to be adjusted upwards. For the past several years, two markets have continuously outperformed GWEC’s most optimistic expectations — the United States and China, it reports.

For the next year or two, developments in the U.S. are expected to be hampered by a lack of financing and the overall economic downturn, before the stimulus package will start having a major impact on the market. At the same time, growth in China is set to continue at a breathtaking rate, driving a substantial increase in global wind energy installations in the coming years, it adds.

“Strong policy support for wind power will continue to drive growth in our three main markets: China, Europe and the U.S.. Governments are turning the current crisis into an opportunity, putting wind power at the center of their economic stimulus and recovery programmes,” said Steve Sawyer, secretary general of the GWEC. “This will create many thousands of jobs, improve energy security and help address the climate crisis.”

“Of course the financial crisis is affecting the wind energy industry, just like any other sector. At the same time the outlook for wind energy is very healthy,” said Arthouros Zervos, GWEC’s chairman. “All of the fundamental drivers that have made wind power the technology of choice for those seeking to build a secure, clean energy future are still in place. Wind power is clean, indigenous, fast to deploy, creates many jobs, uses virtually no water and is economically competitive. Neither the threat of climate change nor the macroeconomic insecurity due to reliance on imported fossil fuel is going to go away because of the recession.”

IE