Renewable Energy & Sustainability Heroes by GineersNow Engineering GineersNow Engineering Magazine Issue No. 017, Ren | Page 33

WWEA General Assembly, Tokyo, October 2016:
From left: Stefan Gsänger, WWEA Secretary General, Tetsu Iida, Executive Director
ISEP and winner of World Wind Energy Honorary Award 2016, Naoto Kan, former
Prime Minister of Japan, Peter Rae, WWEA President, in Fukushima, November 2016
survival of humans, began to mature and to
become less costly – and eventually brought
us to the situation where we are today:
Renewable energies are already dominating
new investment in the energy sector, because
they are available and accessible everywhere,
because they are affordable, because they
are practically inexhaustible and because they
are the solution to air pollution and climate
change.
WWEA is proud to call itself part of this
movement towards renewable energy and
that many of WWEA’s members and friends,
in their regional or national context, have been
instrumental in bringing the world to where it
stands today.
What are the achievements we are
especially proud of?
Establishing WWEA as a global network
with global impact
More than 15 years after its foundation,
WWEA brings together, directly and indirectly,
From right: Stefan Gsänger, WWEA Secretary General, Kaoru Kobayashi,
Mayor of Fukushima, Franz Alt, renowned German journalist, at World
Community Power Conference 2016 in Fukushima, November 2016
the pioneers and countless practitioners
from more than 100 countries. This network
of experts and expertise allows the wind
community to exchange information across
the globe, share visions and develop new
ideas. Also beyond the wind community,
WWEA has become an advisor with direct
impact on governments as well as on
international organisations.
Mainstreaming wind power
and renewable energy
Thanks to WWEA’s impact, many countries
introduced legislation to support wind power
and other renewable energies. Today, the
capacity of the wind turbines installed all
over the world has exceeded 500,000 MW
– enough to cover around 5% of the global
electricity demand, with several countries
having reached 10, 20 or more than 40%.
To highlight only one concrete example:
When WWEA held the 3rd World Wind Energy
Conference in Beijing end of the year 2004,
China had an installed wind capacity of around
500 MW. In the aftermath of this event, China