Extrapolated 20m Wind Speeds for Wind Farms Worldwide

Summary:

• Wind farms operating in 2021 could add 200+GWs of VAWTs in >6m/s wind speeds
• 41 countries have wind farms with >8m/s average annual wind speeds at 20m above ground level

Origin: thewindpower.net database purchased in Oct. 2021 included wind farms installed as of the end of 2020.

Database adjustments: All offshore wind farms were removed. Note that many wind farms had inadequate location information.

Wind speed source: UL Windnavigator. Note that the location in a wind farm for the wind speed assessment was random.

Database analysis by: Omar Garcia

Notes: 

• Wind speed estimates from UL Navigator were collected from all wind farms that could be found.
• Windnavigator’s margin of error ranged between 0.375 to 0.75m/s.
• Extrapolation was based on MWs found, not on the number of wind farms found in each country.
• Predicted wind speeds may not represent the average or highest wind speed in the wind farm.
• Over 8000 wind farms were evaluated in producing this summary.
• Conservative assumption is 1 MW of VAWTs can be added into a wind farm for each 1 MW of HAWTs.
• The total number of onshore wind farms is only increasing with time, and should easily double between 2021 and 2035, meaning these predictions are almost certainly under-estimates.
• This assumes on average that VAWTs only double the capacity of the wind farms. In California, a more detailed analysis shows that in addition to the 6000 MWs of HAWTs, the state’s Wind Resource Areas could add 15,000 MWs of VAWTs. 

See more information in Wind Harvest’s VAWT Market Size in Wind Farms Calculator.