Wind Power Will Generate Seven Percent of the World's Power by 2018: Report

Right now, wind power generates less than three percent of the planet's power. If current trends hold, the worldwide supply of wind energy will more than double by 2018. That's a serious achievement, given that the clean energy source has a painful uphill battle against entrenched fossil fueled behemoths like coal and natural gas.

The forecast arrives from the folks at Navigant, a market research firm that hones in on the clean technology industry. The group's latest report finds that, despite a slow year in 2013, offshore and onshore wind farm installations will resume ramping up, technology will continue to improve, and the industry will see significant growth.

That growth will occur most pointedly in developing markets—not in the US, where clean energy incentives have fallen to the wayside, the victim of political battles and climate change-denying politicians.

"Last year was the first in which the wind industry experienced negative growth since 2004, but there are signs that the 2013 slowdown will turn out to be an anomaly," Feng Zhao, Navigant's research director told CleanTechnica. "As wind turbine vendors search for new opportunities in emerging markets, primarily in Latin America and Africa, and develop machines for maximum energy production in low windspeed areas, the industry is expected to add another 250 gigawatts of capacity through 2018."

Seven percent is nothing to sneeze at—that's a major step towards cleaning up our hopelessly dirty energy production. The real trick will be continuing that rate of gain beyond 2018—and getting China, India, Russia, and the United States to draw down their reliance on fossil fuels.