Wind energy plants with a combined power of some 38,000 megawatts were created last years, according to a new report published by the World Wind Energy Association (WWEA).

The new facilities put the amount of wind power generated around the world at 200,000 megawatts, which is similar to the energy generated by 200 nuclear power plants and represents about 2.5 percent of world energy production.

The sector is doing best in China, the world's largest producer of wind energy.

More than half of all 2010's wind power turbines were installed in China, which generated 45,000 megawatts of wind energy last year.

The result put China ahead of the United States, which has seen wind energy production triple to about 40,000 megawatts since 2006.

In Europe, Spain and Germany between them generated more than half of the continent's 86,000 megawatts of wind energy.

European example

Europe is also an example of how wind energy can be used effectively, according to the study.

Denmark currently meets 21 percents of its electricity needs with wind power while Spain gets 18 percent and Portugal 16 percent. In Germany, wind power currently accounts for 9 percent of the country's energy needs, a percentage that could grow to 25 percent within the next decade, the study said.

New wind power plants in Europe contributed 10,000 megawatts of electricity to the grid in 2010, which is more than new coal, gas, oil and nuclear power facilities combined.

Eastern European nations, particularly Romania, Bulgaria, Poland and Croatia, have made investments in wind power facilities a priority, the WWEA study said.

Gust of growth

Increasing at an annual rate of 20 percent, wind energy will continue to play an important role in countries' energy production around the world and will account for as much as a fifth of global electricity production by 2020 if current trends continue, the study said.

The study also showed that lower costs were counted among the top reasons to invest in wind power rather than other renewable energy sources.

Wind power currently costs between 5 euro cents and 9 euro cents ($0.07 and $0.13) per kilowatt hour, while nuclear power can cost more than 20 euro cents per kilowatt hour.

Costs for wind energy production are also going down thanks to mass production and technological innovation.

The WWEA report forecast the cost of a wind power plant in 20 years to be half of what it is today.

Although offshore wind parks have been receiving increasing media attention, they still only contribute around 3 percent of wind energy production.

Offshore parks are more expensive to build and maintain than on-shore facilities, though they often generate more reliable power, the report added.

Author: Gero Rüter / sms

Editor: Nathan Witkop