As the USA dithers China has expanded its wind power industry to a world beating level

China has the largest installed wind capacity on earth,  standing at an impressive 149 gigawatts. Both its installed capacity and its new capacity dwarve that of the country with the second largest wind power capacity, the United States.

Inner Mongolia is the region with the largest capacity and production. The sparsely populated province generated 241,000 gigawatt hours.

China’s world leadership in wind energy is part of the Chinese government’s plans to push the world’s largest nation by population into a renewable energy powerhouse.

The largest wind turbine developer is Goldwind, based in Xinjiang province. The country is dominated by the onshore wind producers, with a much smaller offshore sector dominated by foreign players such as Siemens.

A major project is the Gansu Wind Farm. A group of wind farms under construction in the Gansu province that upon complete will have a combined capacity of eight gigawatts.

Despite the large installed capacity of China its problems relate to its ability to connect to the grid with approximately 25% of the total capacity currently connected. It is a result of this loss of connectivity to the grid that the USA is a bigger wind producer that China.

The completion of the Gansu Wind Farm together with a number of other wind projects under construction should help the Chinese wind industry to reach a position of dominance.