Wind power showed strong growth in the European Union in 2014, with 11,791 MW of new wind capacity—5.3% more than the previous year—bringing the cumulative capacity to 128.8 GW, according to data from the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA). Of the 22 countries that installed new capacity that year, only four had lower figures than Spain: Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, and Estonia. In contrast, Germany and the United Kingdom—considered models for their industrial and energy policies—accounted for 59.5% of the new installations.
According to the EWEA report, «2014 highlights the negative impact of the political, regulatory, and market uncertainty sweeping across Europe, with unstable legislative frameworks holding back investment in wind power.» Spain is the best example of this situation: according to data from the Spanish Wind Energy Association (AEE), installed wind power capacity increased by only 27.48 MW in 2014—the lowest growth in twenty years—as a result of the legal uncertainty introduced by the Energy Reform.
Given, moreover, that the government has not yet called for bids to bring new wind power capacity online, one might think that its goal is for Spain to continue to remain on the sidelines in the coming years of a market in which a total of 18,700 million euros was invested in Europe in 2014 alone. However, according to the Energy Plan of the Ministry of Industry, Energy, and Tourism to meet the European targets for renewable energy consumption by 2020, it would be necessary to install between 4,553 and 6,473 MW of wind power over six years and invest between 6,000 and 8,700 million euros. In the AEE’s view, this is impossible under a retroactive regulatory framework that allows for changes to the economic terms every six years without disclosing the methodology that will be used.
However, in the explanatory memorandum to the draft Royal Decree amending various provisions of the electricity sector (currently under review), the Ministry states that it has detected «the existence of a very significant number of new electricity generation projects, primarily involving renewable energy,» and has therefore decided to require financial guarantees of 20,000 euros per megawatt from all projects applying for grid access. However, it must be borne in mind that the projects that originally applied for grid connection did so when it was free of charge, in the hope that the right conditions for investing in the sector would arise again in the future. It is unlikely that, under the new regulatory conditions, the projects that submitted applications at that time will move forward today.
China's Wind Power Boom
As for the rest of the world, the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC) has released its figures, which show that after the slowdown in 2013, 2014 was a record year: 51,477 MW of wind power capacity was installed worldwide, representing a 44% increase and bringing the total installed capacity to 369.55 GW.
China remains the global driving force, with 23,351 new megawatts of wind power, accounting for 45% of total global growth. India was the second-largest Asian market in terms of new installations, with 2,315 MW. This makes Asia the fastest-growing wind power market in the world: 26,161 MW were installed in 2014. In the United States, another market Spain is looking toward, 4,854 MW were installed that year.
In other words, Spain continues to rank fourth in the world and second in Europe in terms of installed wind power capacity. But it risks losing its leadership position if other countries strongly commit to the sector while Spain allows it to stagnate.
