RES Scenario in the European Union - The Sustainability of Renewable Energy in Europe - page 42

2.2 RES in the EU

In the EU, in 2012, the energy coming from RES accounted for 14.1 % of gross final
consumption, covering about 8 % of EU electricity demand. There is an increase
from 1 year to the other of the weight of the share of energy consumed from RES
compared to the total energy consumed on average (Table 2.5 ).
Overall, RES status in the EU is good since some RES technologies have shown
rapid progress. In fact, what you thought was in the 1990s an ambitious target for
2010 has already been reached for some technologies. In 1997, the European Com-
mission had made some projections for RES in its White Paper for a Community
Strategy and Action Plan. Wind and PV have even exceeded the target: wind en-
ergy, with a cumulative installed capacity at the end of 2010, amounting to 84 GW
has exceeded the target of the White Paper of 40 GW; PV, at the end of 2010, has
shown an installed capacity of approximately 27 GW against the target of 3 GW of
installed capacity.
Albeit slowly, the use of RES increased in the EU, reaching a share of 14.1%
in the Eu final energy consumption. According to Eurostat ( 2013 ), Sweden, Bul-
garia, and Estonia have already achieved the 2020 targets set by the RES Directive
(2009/28/EC). The EU countries that have increased the consumption of RES are
Sweden (increased from 38.7 % in 2004 to 51 % in 2012), Denmark (from 14.5 to
26 %), Austria (from 22.7 32.1 %), Greece (from 7.2 to 15.1 %) and Italy (from 5.7
to 13.5 %). The countries most green in absolute terms are Sweden (EU record with
51 %, exceeding eight years ahead of the target of 49 %), Latvia (35.8 %), Finland
(34.3 %) and Austria (32.1 %). Estonia was the first to reach the 2020 target early in
2011 (extendable to 25.2 % in 2012), followed in 2012 also from Bulgaria (16.3 %).
The less virtuous countries regarding the use of RES are Malta (1.4 %), Luxem-
bourg (3.1 %), Great Britain (4.2 %) and the Netherlands (4.5 %).
It is interesting to look at the situation of the individual RES in the EU.
With reference to wind power, 2012 has been a positive year for the EU wind
energy market: the new installed capacity during the year was 11840 MW enabling
the EU to greatly exceed the threshold of 100 GW of installed capacity (MW
105635). Subtracting the disused installations, wind power of the EU has increased
by 11,593 MW in 2012, compared with an increase of 9299 MW in 2011.
The wind power capacity in the EU is currently 209.7 kW per 1000 inhabitants.
By taking into account this indicator to assess the weight of wind power in a sin-
gle state, the main EU countries are Denmark (754.8 kW/1000 inhabitants), Spain
(4888 kW/1000 inhabitants), and Portugal (429.2 kW/1000 inhabitants).
Several factors have contributed to the strong growth of the EU market in 2012
and mainly they are related to offshore wind farms at high power in the North Sea
as well as onshore parks in Scotland. Another factor is the emerging markets of
eastern EU countries (Poland, Romania, and Austria in particular) that have been
very dynamic in 2012, driven by the sharp increase in the price of gas.
As regards offshore wind, the power connected to the network in the EU amount-
ed to 4705.8 MW in 2012, which corresponds to about 1156.4 MW of additional