Wind power industry

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The wind power industry is the industry involved with the design, manufacture, construction, and maintenance of wind turbines. Although the wind power industry is small compared to those of the conventional power generation technologies (hydro, coal, natural gas, and nuclear), it is growing at a much faster rate (about 25% per year).

The modern wind power industry began in 1979 with the serial production of wind turbines by Danish manufacturers Kuriant, Vestas, Nordtank, and Bonus. Initially, most of these early turbines were installed in western Denmark. California, USA experienced a wind power boom from 1982 to 1986 when thousands of Danish and American wind turbines were installed in massive arrays. India got involved in wind power in the mid-1980s as well, while Germany and Spain gradually developed domestic wind power industries starting in the early 1990s.

The wind power industry is currently undergoing a period of rapid globalization, with much of the recent wind farm development occuring outside the older established markets. Several large companies with market capitalizations greater than the entire wind power industry itself (GE, Siemens, BP, Shell) are now making large investments in wind power. To meet a global wind turbine supply shortage, start-up wind turbine manufacturers are still appearing and ramping up the production of their new wind turbine models as quickly as possible.