While you may now be taking down the Christmas Lights and ruminating on how to get rid of those excess pounds piled on this Yuletide, December was a cause for celebration in the UK’s wind fraternity: U.K. wind farms generated a record amount of electricity in December as well as hitting weekly and daily highs after installed capacity rose 45 percent in a single year, said RenewableUK.
Hold your chair arms and get a rush from this blast of windy welcome news- UK wind turbines generated a total of 2,841,080 megawatt-hours (MWh) over the 31-day period. That’s enough to power more than 5.7 million UK homes. Daily generation rose to as high as 17 percent of the national total on December 21, the group said. It was very likely that as many as 14 million Christmas Turkeys were roasted in the oven using wind-generated electricity. What a Christmas cracker!
Britain is relying on wind power, both onshore and offshore, to boost its share of energy from renewables to a European Union requirement of at least 15 percent by 2020. That’s a tall order, given only 4.1 percent in 2012, but seems reachable if the coalition Government keep their nerve and don’t succumb to calls for more nuclear power stations and unpopular fracking at the expense of keeping the foot on the gas (errr.. wind) for more and larger wind farms.
Installed capacity rose to 9,710 MW at the end of June from 6,856 MW a year earlier, according to RenewableUK.
The Deputy CE of Renewable, Maf Smith, said
“This gives us a great sense of confidence for the year ahead when we will continue to increase the amount of clean power we generate from wind, onshore and offshore. It provides cast-iron proof that the direction of travel away from dirty fossil fuels to clean renewable sources is unstoppable.”
And so say all of us!
