“The report provides a Europe-wide resource assessment of onshore and offshore wind potential in a geographically explicit manner. In addition to calculating raw wind resource potential, this study also introduces and quantitatively analyses the environmental and social constraints on wind sector development. The report also evaluates the future costs of wind energy production across Europe in order to gauge the potential output at competitive rates.
Report shows EWEA target of 230 GW for 2020 is within easy reach
The estimated technical potential for wind energy on land is calculated to be around 45,000 TWh in all EEA countries together in 2030, while the offshore technical potential in 2030 is two-thirs that of onshore and is estimated at 30,000 TWh. This confirms that the European Wind Energy Association’s 230 GW target for 2020 is easily achievable, and would result in the production of approximately 600 TWh per annum in the EU by 2020; power equivalent to the needs of approximately 60% of EU households.
Nevertheless, the EEA has identified a number of concerns regarding noise and the visual impact of wind power, as well as the deaths of birds and bats that fly into rotor blades, which can affect the technical potential for wind energy on land. Although the EEA considers that there are few environmental impacts which represent true barriers to the development of onshore wind farms, it recalculated wind energy potential, excluding Natura 2000 areas and other designated areas. When the aggregated Natura 2000 and CDDA areas are shielded from wind energy developments, the available land decreases by 13.7 %, and assuming that the protected areas are spread equally over all land cover classes, the technical potential decreases to 39,000 TWh.
The report also highlights that: “social constraints, grid system i.e. at higher penetration levels particularly concerns regarding the visual additional extensions or upgrades both for impact of wind farms, may further limit the transmission and the distribution grid onshore wind energy development.”
The 30,000 TWh technical potential for offshore wind does not account for the fact that other uses of the sea area may restrict the potential for offshore wind developments. Such uses comprise, for example, shipping routes, military use of offshore areas, oil and gas exploration, and tourist zones. If these restrictions are applied the unrestricted technical potential for offshore wind drops from 30,000 TWh to 3,500 TWh in the years to 2030. Although this appears to be a significant reduction, this amount of electricity from wind would still be sufficient to fulfil about 78 % of the projected electricity demand in Europe in 2030 (5,100 TWh).
Need to improve electricity grids if offshore wind capacity is to be tapped
The EEA also warns that because offshore wind resources are not equally distributed across the continent and are primarily in northern Europe, “large-scale development of offshore wind power would imply that production would need to feed in to the grid via entry points on the coast in northern Europe. The capacity of the existing grid to transmit the power from the new wind farms to the consumers may be insufficient.” In some Member States, especially in Germany, a bottleneck already exists already or is expected in the future if wind capacity in the North Sea is expanded significantly.
Economically competitive wind energy potential still considerable
The main parameters determining the cost of wind energy are investment costs (i.e. turbine costs, foundations, electrical installations, connections to the electrical grid, and road construction) and operation and maintenance costs. The EEA has compared wind power production costs to the PRIMES baseline average electricity generation cost and has found that the onshore potential for wind decreases considerably to 9,600 TWh in 2020, while offshore wind potential decreases to 2,600 TWh. Nevetheless, “the economically competitive wind energy potential still amounts to more than three times projected demand in 2020”.
“The fact that the competitive potential even in a relative short time horizon is much bigger than the electricity demand means that the key need for policy makers should be on facilitating the integration of wind energy into the energy system,” concludes the EEA. These conclusions have been welcomed by the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA). “The EEA clearly recognises that wind power will be key to Europe's energy future,” said Christian Kjaer, EWEA's Chief Executive Officer. “Now that oil prices are again on the rise, the EEA report sends a reminder to Europe's policy makers that wind power is a clean and proven energy technology and Europe is the world leader,” added Kjaer.
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