Offshore wind installations slowed down in the first half of the year, new research has found.
According to the World Forum Offshore Wind’s new Global Offshore Wind Report for the first half of the year, the world added a total of 5.6GW of offshore wind capacity during first half of 2023, reaching a total global installed offshore wind capacity total of 63.2 GW.
The same period for 2022 saw new installations of 6.8GW worldwide.
Global offshore wind growth during the first six months of the year was again substantially driven by China which installed 2.2 GW of new offshore wind capacity.
However, the slowdown was also driven by China, as its new additions were less than half of the 5.1GW made in the first half of 2022.
In total, 15 new offshore wind farms saw all turbines installed and first power produced worldwide during the first half of the year, 10 installed in Asia and five in Europe.
China expanded its position as the world’s largest offshore wind market by far with 28.7GW of installed capacity. It is followed by the UK (14.7 GW), Germany (8.3 GW) and the Netherlands (4.5 GW). 45% of the world’s total offshore wind capacity is now installed in China.
An additional 10.2GW of offshore wind capacity is currently under construction worldwide.
The Chinese offshore wind sector leads the way with 2.4GW of capacity under construction very closely followed by Taiwan with 2.4GW.
The UK is in third place with a total capacity of 1.6GW under construction followed by France with 1GW. The US saw two projects enter offshore construction which add up to a total of 938 MW of capacity under construction.
Gunnar Herzig, Managing Director, World Forum Offshore Wind (WFO): “Global offshore wind growth slowed down during HY1 2023. Not only do we see less new capacity installed compared to HY1 2022, but also a reduction in construction activities.”