The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) has released its latest Global Energy Transformation Report, which explores global energy development scenarios up to the year 2050.

The report states that Asia – mainly China (at more than 2,000 GW) and India (at more than 300 GW) – would continue to lead global onshore wind power installations, with the region accounting for more than half (2,656 GW) of the total global capacity by 2050.

After Asia, the report says, a large number of onshore wind power deployments would occur in North America (mainly the U.S., at more than 850 GW), where the installed capacity would grow more than ten-fold from 2018 levels, reaching around 1 150 GW by 2050.

Ongoing improvements in wind turbine technologies and deployment of the latest technologies in markets such as China and India would further improve the average capacity factor, to reach 55% by 2030 and 58% by 2050, notes IRENA.

The reports adds that at the regional level, Asia would continue to lead the way and it would account for more than half of the global average annual investments, with almost $98 billion/year invested in the region from now until 2030 and $101 billion/year invested in the last two decades to 2050 (mostly in China and India).

Offshore wind technology gives countries the freedom to exploit the generally higher and sometimes smoother wind resources offshore while achieving gigawatt-scale projects close to the densely populated coastal areas.

The report underlines that going forward, a prominent shift in deployment would take place in Asia (mostly in China and India) in the next three decades. Asia would eventually dominate global offshore wind power installations with a total capacity exceeding 100 GW by 2030 and 600 GW by 2050.

At the regional level, more than half of the overall global average annual offshore wind investments would be needed to accelerate offshore wind deployments in key emerging markets in Asia.

India is also making rapid strides in the development of wind energy. The report states that the Indian market is structured very differently as compared to other wind markets in Europe and the U.S. Siemens-Gamesa is the only European player with meaningful market penetration, having a share of 23.8% in 2018. The market is dominated by local manufacturers (Suzlon 33.7%, Inox 12.1%). GE is the only other non-Indian producer in the top six suppliers.

The report further notes that India has introduced a national wind-solar hybrid policy to resolve grid integration issues, with a proposed target of 10 GW of hybrid projects to be installed by 2022. Before approval of this policy, Hero Future Energies completed India’s first hybrid project, combining a 50 MW wind farm with a 28.8 MW solar PV site in Raichur district in April 2018. The Solar Energy Corporation of India recently issued tenders for 2.5 GW of hybrid wind and solar projects to be connected to the country’s Interstate Transmission System.

SECI had initially tendered 2,500 MW of ISTS-connected wind-solar hybrid power projects (tranche-I). Later, the capacity of the ISTS-connected wind-solar hybrid power project was reduced to 1,200 MW. Since the tender was undersubscribed by 150 MW, SECI auctioned only 80 percent of the bid capacity (1,050 MW), which is 840 MW.

In the first mega solar-wind hybrid auction conducted in India by SECI, a tariff of ₹2.67 (~$0.03794)/kWh had emerged as the lowest one.