Wind speed up

It has been another record year for newly installed wind capacity – to the tune of 39.4 GW. The year 2010 brought total installed capacity worldwide to around 200,000 MW, an impressive increase in cumulative worldwide installations of some 25 percent. However, in terms of the volume of annual installed capacity the increase was a far more modest three percent.

For the industry as a whole, the year-on-year growth rate in 2010 in fact decreased from 35 percent in 2009 to just 3%. Remarkably, it is the first year that the market has shown a slowdown in growth since 2004.

China made the greatest contribution to the global wind power installations in 2010 and it is important to note that 48 percent of the world's installations over the year took place in the country. Consolidation among turbine suppliers has been a particularly strong feature over the past three years.

It is worth noting that 2010 also saw more MW-rated Chinese manufactured turbines exported. During the year, five Chinese turbine suppliers installed 13 machines in five different foreign markets.

Asia experienced significant growth, including the OECD Pacific region which increased its cumulative capacity from 42,037 MW in 2009 to 63,645 MW in 2010, a growth of 51.4 percent. China was by far and away the leading country, with 18,928 MW of new capacity in 2010. India also saw an increase to see 2139 MW of new installations. The region as a whole accounted for 54.8 percent of the year's global total.

The offshore sector has expanded, with a total capacity of 1444 MW installed in 2010, which represents a 109 percent annual increase. Nine new offshore wind farms, with a combined power generating capacity of 1405 MW, were installed in Europe, especially the UK. The remainder of new offshore capacity was in China.