France's H1 wind turbine additions almost halve

A total of 363 MW of new wind turbine capacity started feeding electricity to the French power network in the first half of 2020, new statistics show.

The country commissioned 36 wind farms and registered a 45% drop in the overall capacity that went online in the six months, according to data released by the government last week. In the year-ago period, 664 MW of capacity became operational from 65 facilities.

The Hauts-de-France region was the leader in terms of newly-commissioned capacity with 166 MW of wind farms going live in the first half of the year.

At the end of June, France’s cumulative installed wind turbine capacity stood at 17,000 MW, against 16,641 MW at end-December 2019, with around 16,906 MW of the total being located in mainland France. Those power plants generated 21.4 TWh of electricity in January-June and supplied 9.5% of the overall electricity consumption in the country. Thanks to the favourable weather conditions, the output climbed by 29% in annual terms.

France's pipeline of wind projects at the end of June totalled 13,000 MW, including 3,100 MW of projects that have grid-connection contracts in place.

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