Page 31 - Wind Energy Handbook

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT 5

Figure 1.5 Wind Farm of Six Pitch-regulated Wind Turbines in Flat Terrain (Reproduced by
permission of Wind Prospect Ltd., www.windprospect.com)

and the potential of wind energy to help limit climate change. In 1997 the Commis-
sion of the European Union published its White Paper (CEU, 1997) calling for 12
percent of the gross energy demand of the European Union to be contributed from
renewables by 2010. Wind energy was identified as having a key role to play in the
supply of renewable energy with an increase in installed wind turbine capacity
from 2.5 GW in 1995 to 40 GW by 2010. This target is likely to be achievable since at
the time of writing, January 2001, there was some 12 GW of installed wind-turbine
capacity in Europe, 2.5 GW of which was constructed in 2000 compared with only
300 MW in 1993. The average annual growth rate of the installation of wind
turbines in Europe from 1993–9 was approximately 40 percent (Zervos, 2000). The
distribution of wind-turbine capacity is interesting with, in 2000, Germany account-
ing for some 45 percent of the European total, and Denmark and Spain each having
approximately 18 percent. There is some 2.5 GW of capacity installed in the USA of
which 65 percent is in California although with increasing interest in Texas and
some states of the midwest. Many of the California wind farms were originally