Global wind power capacity grew by just over 30% last year, according to the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC).
The global wind market for turbine installations in 2009 was worth about $63bn, adding 37.5GW to bring total worldwide installations to 157.9GW.
The main markets driving growth continue to be Asia, North America and Europe, each of which installed more than 10GW of new wind capacity in 2009.
China doubled its wind generation capacity from 12.1GW in 2008 to 25.1GW in 2009, to become the world’s largest market of the year.
With a capacity addition of over 24GW, Asia became the biggest regional market during the period.
The US, which continues to lead in terms of installed capacity, added about 10GW in 2009 bringing its total capacity to 35GW, recording an increase of 39%.
Europe installed 10.5GW led by Spain and Germany followed by Italy, France and the UK.
