A record-breaking offshore wind production capacity of 15.668 MW has been put into operation on the global level in 2021 in comparison with 5206 MW in 2020, prompted by the production in China and announced in the new report of the World Forum Offshore Wind (WFO)- as reported by the Renews.biz website.
It is noted in the ‘Global Offshore Wind Report for 2021’ that in that year China has installed 12.7 GW of new offshore wind farms. Many companies have stepped up to complete their projects before the end of the year due to the expiry of the federal feed-in tariffs for offshore wind farms. Globally installed offshore wind farm capacities have reached 48.2 GW at the end of 2021, as compared to 32.5 GW of 2020. In 2021, 53 offshore wind farms became operational of which 25 were installed in China, three in Great Britain, two in The Netherlands, one in Denmark, one in Taiwan and one in Norway. China is now by far the greatest world market of offshore wind farms with an installed capacity of 19.7 GW, almost as much as the United Kingdom (12,3 GW) and Germany (7.7 GW) together. Overall, 40% of the total installed offshore wind capacities in the world are in China now.
In regard to offshore wind farms under construction, China is once again leading the way, The Chinese sector of offshore wind farms is continuing to grow with an overall capacity of 7003 MW which is currently under development. The United Kingdom is in second place with an overall capacity of 2900 MW under construction, followed by Taiwan (2505 MW) and The Netherlands (2220 MW).
In addition, work has started on the development of the first commercial offshore wind farms in France (976 MW), Japan (140MW), Norway 88MW floating) and Italy (30MW). In Germany, as a result of the disturbance caused by changes in the regulatory framework for offshore wind farms in 2017, there was zero capacity development for the second year in a row.
