01 March 2010

The new report of the European Wind Energy Association presents optimistic results concerning the growing share of renewable energy and wind power in the European energy production.

According to the report renewable power installations constituted 61% of new installations built in Europe in 2009, whereas wind power installations accounted for 39% of them. 2009 was the second year running that more wind power was installed than any other energy generating technology. The statistics confirm that the EU power sector continues its move away from coal, fuel oil and nuclear, each technology continuing to decommission more than it installs.

EWEA points out to a steady increasing trend of wind power installations in the last 15 years, from 472 MW in 1994 to 10,163 MW in 2009, an annual average market growth of 23%. A total of 74,767 MW is now installed in the European Union with Germany remaining the EU country with the largest installed capacity, followed by Spain, Italy, France, and the UK.