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Field guide

Wind power

Sky-high pinwheels, picky weather, and a front-row seat for birds, bats, and neighbours.

Set the scene

Wind power uses turbines to capture kinetic energy from moving air. IPCC AR6 WGIII reports that onshore and offshore wind expanded quickly before 2020; wind and solar PV together accounted for about 8% of global electricity in 2019 (wind about 5.5% and solar PV about 2.5% of total generation—high confidence). Integration, wildlife, and community acceptance are central trade-offs.

Signal, not noise

Three snaps from the evidence

3 beats
  1. 01

    IPCC AR6 WGIII states wind generation grew about 70% from 2015 to 2019 (to 1420 TWh/yr), alongside policy support and falling costs.

  2. 02

    Electricity systems with high shares of variable renewables can be viable, but need flexibility, transmission, and market design (high confidence).

  3. 03

    Offshore wind can access stronger, steadier winds in some regions but faces higher capital costs and marine logistics.

Chart break

Explore the data

Electricity generation from wind power (terawatt-hours). Change region or year in the chart; see the grapher page for data sources and units.

Chart: Our World in Data (CC BY). Each grapher page lists the underlying datasets, units, and processing notes—use it when citing numbers.

Open on Our World in Data

No fairy tales

Where it helps—and where it hurts

Strengths

  • Mature technology with substantial global deployment experience and declining costs in many markets.
  • No fuel combustion at the turbine; operating-stage direct emissions are very low compared with unabated fossil plants.
  • Onshore repowering can upgrade older sites; offshore can reduce land-use conflicts where seas are suitable.

Limits & trade-offs

  • Output varies with wind speed and season; forecasting and system reserves are essential at high penetration.
  • Wildlife and habitat impacts (notably birds and bats, plus marine ecosystems offshore) require siting studies and mitigation.
  • Noise, visual impacts, and fairness of community benefits can affect social acceptance.

Read the receipts

Sources for this page

These entries are starting points for verification. Prefer the original report or dataset when checking numbers and figures.

  1. IPCC AR6 WGIII Ch. 6Clarke, L., Wei, Y.-M., De La Vega Navarro, A., Garg, A., Hahmann, A. N., Khennas, S., Azevedo, I. M. L., Loschel, A., Singh, A. K., Steg, L., Strbac, G., & Wada, K. (2022). Energy systems. In P. R. Shukla et al. (Eds.), Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change (IPCC AR6 WGIII, Chapter 6). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009157926.008
  2. IEA RenewablesInternational Energy Agency. (2024). Renewables 2024: Analysis and forecast to 2030. IEA. https://www.iea.org/reports/renewables-2024
  3. IPCC AR6 WGIII Technical SummaryPathak, M., Slade, R., Shukla, P. R., Skea, J., Pichs-Madruga, R., & Urge-Vorsatz, D. (2022). Technical summary. In P. R. Shukla et al. (Eds.), Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change (IPCC AR6 WGIII). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009157926.002
  4. Our World in DataRitchie, H., & Rosado, P. (2020). Electricity mix. Our World in Data. https://ourworldindata.org/electricity-mix (underlying grapher datasets include Ember and Energy Institute series, cited per chart metadata).