Renewables Reality Check

First, the good news. The United States invested in $9 billion in wind energy in 2007, and generating capacity increased by 46%, the world’s fastest growth rate for the third consecutive year.

Those figures, released this week by the U.S. Department of Energy, also show that wind projects accounted for 35% of all new electrical generation capacity last year, and there is more than 200 GW of wind plants currently in development.

Those figures all sound impressive, so here’s the reality check. Only 1.2% of U.S. electricity supplies were from wind at the end of 2007.

For perspective, several countries in Europe get a major chunk of their power from renewable sources. In Sweden, the region’s top producer of green power, the figure is 40%, and they hope to boost that to 49% by 2020. Latvia generates 35% of its power with renewables now, and expects to reach 42% by 2020.

And Portugal, which generates 21% of its power from renewable sources, has set out on an ambitious path. The world’s largest solar plant is currently under construction there, a 45 MW project that will be about twice the size of the biggest solar farms now, and Portugal’s economics minister Manuel Pinho, recently issued what amounts to a green energy declaration of independence.

“We have to reduce our dependence on oil and gas. What seemed extravagant in 2004 when we decided to go for renewables now seems to have been a very good decision,” he said.

“When you have a program like this, there is no need for nuclear power. Wind and water are our nuclear power. The relative price of renewables is now much lower, so the incentives are there to invest. My advice to countries like the U.K. is to move as fast as they can to renewables. With climate change and the increase in oil prices, renewables will soon become more and more important.”

And though he didn’t mention us by name, I’m pretty sure his advice would apply to the United States as well.