Wind power in Germany

Wind power in Germany describes wind power in Germany as part of energy in Germany and renewable energy in Germany. In 2015, the installed capacity of wind power in Germany was 44,470 megawatts (MW), with wind power producing about 13.3 percent of Germany’s total electrical power. According to EWEA in a typical wind year, installed wind capacity in Germany was estimated to have met 10.6% at end 2011 and 9.3% at end 2010 of the German electricity needs. The persistent disparity between EWEA estimates for a "normal wind year" and the actual data tabulated below may be due to the EWEA relying on an unrealistically high capacity factor for German wind production.

More than 26,772 wind turbines were located in the German federal area by year end 2015, and the country has plans for further expansion. As of the end of 2015 Germany was the third largest producer of wind power in the world by installations, behind China and the USA, and ahead of India, Spain and the United Kingdom.

Since 2011, Germany's federal government has been working on a new plan for increasing renewable energy commercialization, with a particular focus on offshore wind farms. A major challenge will be the development of sufficient network capacities for transmitting the power generated in the North Sea to the large industrial consumers in southern Germany.

In Germany, hundreds of thousands of people have invested in citizens' wind farms across the country and thousands of small and medium-sized enterprises are running successful businesses in a new sector that in 2008 employed 90,000 people and generated 8 percent of Germany's electricity. Wind power has gained very high social acceptance in Germany.

...
Wikipedia