Record wind power installations in 2020 have secured China’s position at the top of the global industry despite waning subsidies from Beijing. The 52 gigawatts of new wind power added last year doubled the capacity China installed in 2019, according to a report released on Thursday by the Global Wind Energy Council, a Belgium-based international trade association.
China’s surge in installations was in part driven by 2020 being the final chance for companies to take advantage of central government subsidies and favourable prices for onshore wind farms.
The Chinese wind market exceeded the council’s forecasts by more than 70 per cent, elevating wind-generated power in China above the combined total for Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Latin America.
That surge meant that east Asia accounted for about three-fifths of global installations, up from about 50 per cent last year.
Although China accounts for about 94 per cent of installations in the region, Australia, Japan, Kazakhstan and Sri Lanka also had record years. An outlier was India, which installed the lowest level of wind capacity since 2004 owing to regulatory hurdles. North and Latin America installed 22 gigawatts, nearly 17 of which was in the US.
Liang Wanliang, a China director for GWEC, said Beijing’s policy support for renewables had led the association to revise forecasts of a significant drop in installations this year. Instead, he expected only a slight decrease in installations to a level still above 40 gigawatts.
Top-down policies requiring wind and solar be integrated into the power grid, rather than subsidy support, would probably drive greater transition to renewables, Liang said. “It’s now the grid companies which need to find a solution in order to take more renewables,” he added.