EU countries will install 8.6 gigawatts (GW) of new wind capacity in 2009, an annual growth rate of 1% compared to 2008 installations, according to new research from the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA).

The new installations will take the EU's cumulative installed capacity to 73,535 megawatts (MW), up from 2008's cumulative capacity of 64,935MW. In 2008 wind energy, with 8,484MW installed, was the largest source of new electricity generating capacity in the EU, EWEA says.

Inside the EU, there is likely to be a difference between the more established markets in the old EU-15 Member States and the emerging markets of the EU-12, EWEA says. The EU-15 are expected to install a similar number of megawatts in 2009 to the amount they added in 2008, while the EU-12 countries are set to install 150MW more than they installed in 2008 -  an increase of approximately 35%.

"I am pleasantly surprised by the research results," says EWEA Chief Executive Christian Kjaer. "They show that the underlying demand for wind energy technology is currently strong enough to make up for project delays caused by many banks' continued reluctance to provide project finance."

Adding a note of caution, Kjaer says, "although the outlook for 2009 is encouraging, the real test of the wind energy sector's ability to withstand the financial crisis will be 2010". EWEA said that the impact of the financial crisis on the European turbine market had been mitigated by the fact that turbine manufacturers had healthy order books prior to the financial crisis reduces. But the organisation expects the financial crisis to have a deeper impact in 2010, unless measures are taken rapidly to increase liquidity in the financial market. "It is essential that the billions of Euros provided by governments to European banks through stimulus packages reach the real economy", says EWEA.

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