Global wind power capacity: record growth in offshore wind

Story: 2020 C.E. | Last updated: May 11, 2026

The world added more wind power in 2019 C.E. than in almost any year before it. Global wind capacity grew by 60.4 gigawatts — a 19% jump over 2018 C.E. — driven by a record-breaking year for offshore wind and a massive onshore push in the U.S. and China. The milestone marked one of the strongest years in the history of the global wind industry, and pointed toward a future where wind energy plays a central role in how the world powers itself.

At a glance

Wind capacity growth: The world added 60.4 gigawatts of wind power in 2019 C.E., a 19% increase over the previous year, according to the Global Wind Energy Council.
Offshore wind: Offshore installations grew by 6.1 gigawatts — a record — making up a tenth of all new wind capacity for the first time in history.
Onshore wind markets: The U.S. and China together accounted for nearly two-thirds of all global wind power growth, cementing their roles as the world’s dominant wind markets.

Why offshore wind matters so much

Offshore wind has long been seen as wind energy’s most promising frontier. Winds over open water blow harder and more consistently than on land, and turbines can be built larger without the noise and visual concerns that sometimes accompany onshore projects.

For years, offshore wind remained expensive and technically difficult to scale. The 2019 C.E. figures suggest that barrier is coming down. Reaching a tenth of all new installations is not just a number — it signals that offshore wind has crossed from niche technology into mainstream energy infrastructure.

Much of that growth came from Europe, where countries like the U.K., Germany, and Denmark have invested heavily in offshore capacity for over a decade. But the pipeline of offshore projects planned for the early 2020s C.E. pointed to rapid expansion across new markets, including the U.S. East Coast and parts of Asia.

The U.S. and China lead, but the gap remains large

Together, the U.S. and China drove the bulk of the world’s onshore wind growth in 2019 C.E. Both countries have vast land areas, strong policy support for renewables, and electricity grids that need new capacity to meet rising demand.

China, in particular, has added wind capacity at a scale no other country has matched. Its grid-scale buildout has helped drive down the cost of wind turbines globally — a benefit that flows to every country investing in the technology.

Still, the Global Wind Energy Council’s CEO Ben Backwell was direct about the gap between what the industry achieved and what the climate requires. “If we are to have any chance at reaching our Paris agreement objectives and remaining on a 1.5C pathway, we need to be installing at least 100GW of wind energy per year,” he said, “and this needs to rise to 200GW per year and beyond.” The 60.4 gigawatts added in 2019 C.E. was a record, but it was still well short of that target.

A window that opens even in crisis

The Global Wind Energy Council published its annual report in early 2020 C.E., just as the COVID-19 pandemic was beginning to reshape the global economy. The council acknowledged the uncertainty honestly — construction timelines could slip, supply chains could stall, and the forecast for 76 gigawatts of new capacity that year was already under review.

But the council also saw a potential opening. As governments began designing economic stimulus packages, voices across the energy sector urged them to direct that spending toward clean energy. Dr. Fatih Birol of the International Energy Agency argued that a well-designed stimulus could accelerate the clean energy transition while supporting economic recovery. “We have an important window of opportunity,” he said. “Major economies around the world are preparing stimulus packages.”

Wind energy, in that framing, was not just an environmental choice. It was a jobs program, an infrastructure investment, and an economic stabilizer — one that could put people to work building something the world needs for the long term.

The bigger picture on global energy

At the time of the report, renewable energy still made up only 17% of U.S. electricity generation, with coal at 27% and natural gas at 35%. The Global Wind Energy Council’s full 2020 C.E. report made clear that the numbers for wind were moving in the right direction — but the scale of the transition still required was immense.

What the 2019 C.E. figures offered was momentum. The International Renewable Energy Agency has tracked how the cost of wind power has fallen by more than 70% over the past decade, making it one of the cheapest sources of new electricity in many parts of the world. That cost curve, more than any policy, may be the most powerful force driving wind’s continued expansion.

The record year also reflected real engineering progress. The U.S. Department of Energy’s Wind Energy Technologies Office has documented how turbine heights, rotor diameters, and capacity factors have all improved steadily — meaning each new installation produces more power than its predecessors.

One challenge the industry still faces is grid integration. As wind’s share of electricity supply grows, grid operators must manage the variability of wind output — a problem that storage technology and smarter grid design are only beginning to solve at scale. Analysts at Wood Mackenzie have noted that connecting remote wind resources to population centers remains one of the sector’s most persistent bottlenecks.

For more on this story, see: The Guardian

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