Harvesting The Wind

The exploitable onshore wind resource for the EU-25 is conservatively estimated at 600 TWh and the offshore wind resource up to 3,000 TWh; the upper end of this far exceeding the EU-15’s entire electricity consumption. The European Wind Atlas produced by the Danish national research laboratory, Forskningscenter Risø, gives a good overview of the EU potential. Although some countries have pushed ahead fast, most European nations still have large wind resources waiting to be exploited. There is also considerable potential in new Member States and in Candidate Countries.