Germany installed 551 onshore wind turbines with a capacity of 2403MW in 2022, but stakeholders said this number is still too low.
The evaluation by Deutsche WindGuard on behalf of BWE and VDMA Power Systems found that the gross expansion last year was 25% above the previous year’s increase of 1925MW.
Nordex installed and commissioned 173 turbines in its home market of Germany, a combined capacity of 769MW for its customers (2021: 285MW).
However, the associations are appealing to the federal states to use the toolbox provided by federal government and quickly enable significantly more expansion.
Dr Dennis Rendschmidt, managing director of VDMA Power Systems, said: “The expansion of onshore wind turbines last year was still too low.
“In order to switch to the expansion path necessary for the achievement of the target and reliable for the manufacturers of wind turbines, areas must be made available, approval bottlenecks overcome, transports facilitated and certification hurdles for the towers of the turbines removed.
“The measures taken so far are not sufficient.
“We now need a ramp-up of projects as soon as possible – this would be an urgently needed positive industrial policy signal for the entire supply chain in Germany and Europe.
“The wind industry can achieve the necessary production ramp-up not through political goals, but with approved projects.”
President of the German wind energy association BWE Hermann Albers added: “The expansion in 2022 was fed by the tenders awarded in 2019/20 and partly in 2021.
“The last legislature thus continues to weigh on the expansion of wind energy.
“The figures remain sobering for the fifth year in a row. They are symptomatic of the political mismanagement of the last federal government.
“The traffic light coalition has used its first year in office to set the course in many areas for the significantly accelerated expansion of renewable energies and in particular the service provider wind.
“In 2023, a record volume of 12.84GW will be put out to tender. The federal states have a responsibility to make use of the opportunities given to them to speed things up.
“The South, in particular, must finally deliver and must no longer shirk its responsibility. 2023 can be the year of new beginnings for wind energy.”Originally announced as part of the 2022 summer package, the industry is still waiting for the planned acceleration package, according to BWE.For the year 2023, the associations forecast an expected expansion of 2.7GW to 3.2GW at the same speed of implementation.