Rapid pipeline expansion of offshore wind seen in Asia: Fitch

China alone is projected to add 332GW of wind capacity in the next decade.

Asia is the second leading market, following North America and Western Europe (NAWE) region, with the highest volume in the wind project pipeline, Fitch Solutions reported.

In its Global Wind Project Analysis, Fitch reported the wind technology project pipeline climbed significantly to 420 gigawatts (GW) in the fourth quarter of the year from 320GW in the second quarter.

Of this, the NAWE region accounted for 190GW of wind pipeline across all stages of development. In Asia, China has about 14GW worth of projects in the pipeline, including 8GW of offshore wind projects.

The market is also expected to add some 332GW of wind capacity in the next decade. Fitch noted that the actual value of the Asian region in their Key Projects Database may be larger due to the nature of some markets in the region.

The report also noted that offshore wind projects are dominating the wind project pipeline, accounting for 55% against 45% made up of onshore wind projects.

In Asia, offshore wind projects are also expected to accelerate particularly in new markets, driven by the technology cost decline and the maturing global supply chains and manufacturing.

“Markets such as South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and Vietnam are all looking to develop large-scale offshore wind programs accounting for almost all of their respective wind project pipelines,” the report read in part.

Fitch noted that offshore wind has the lowest development risk associated with the sector overall, but onshore remains safer in some markets. Offshore scored 7.6 in the overall project risk metric (PRM) against 6.9 of onshore wind projects.

The NAWE region has the lowest risk region for wind technology’s deployment, whilst Asia cones in second.

“This is due to a large number of onshore wind project cancellations and suspensions in some markets such as India, which has seen significant challenges in realising its wind pipeline.”