Once upon a time, the wind pushed Odysseus’s ships across the ancient seas. A few thousand years on, a bevy of wind energy companies are using it to power the world. But is it really such a breeze?
Wind Energy Industry: A Brief Overview
Wind energy isn’t anything new; in addition to ships, the world’s winds have been harnessed in machines for ventilation, agriculture, and more for thousands of years. But it was only in the 20th century that the first turbines were used for electricity generation, spearheaded by Danish innovation. These were the classic turbines with blades, still widespread today. The concept behind them is simple: as the wind blows, it leaves an area of low air pressure on one side of the blade. That creates lift (which also makes airplanes fly), and causes the blade to lurch forward to fill that area. The rotation of the blades makes the rotor spin, creating electricity that is collected in a generator.
Fearing oil shortages, the US also invested in technology beginning in the 1970s. Then, in the 1990s, climate change became a topic of global concern. Coupled with renewed energy insecurity, this spurred interest and investment in renewable energy in the 2000s. In 2023, wind power generated 7.8% of the world’s energy, compared to just 0.2% in 2000. Its biggest hubs include China (which accounts for 65% of global wind capacity, so Wood Mackenzie), Europe, and the US. The scene is mostly controlled by a set of heavyweight companies using traditional blade turbines – but some crafty startups are experimenting with new methods.
Top Wind Energy Companies (Worldwide)
Goldwind
- Location: China
- Founded: 1998
- Number of employees: 11,000
- Current funding level: $184 million profit for 2023
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/goldwind
Overview: Four out of the world’s five biggest wind companies are Chinese; their leader in 2023 was Goldwind, which accounted for about 14% of the global market by order intakes in 2022. It has installed 51,000 turbines in 40 countries that produce 275 Terawatt-hours (TWh) per year; just one TWh can power around 92,670 average American homes for a year (according to data from the US Energy Information Administration).
Envision
- Location: China
- Founded: 2007
- Number of employees: unknown
- Current funding level: $461.7 million in revenue
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/envision-energy/
Overview: Envision came in second for 2022 with a roughly 12% slice of the market; more recently, however, it achieved a 22 GW order intake for FY2023, overtaking Goldwind. It claims to have achieved carbon neutrality in its global operations in 2022.
Vestas
- Location: Denmark
- Founded: 1945
- Number of employees: 29,000
- Current funding level: $249 million operating profit for 2023
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/vestas
Overview: Though it’s fallen on hard times recently, Denmark’s Vestas still managed to install 11.5 GW worth of turbines in 2023. Its total turbine numbers come in at 88,782: more than any of its competitors, at least according to their public numbers. These span 88 countries, though its biggest hub by far is the US, with almost 25,000 turbines installed there alone.
Windey
- Location: China
- Founded: 1972
- Number of employees: 3,500
- Current funding level: about $326.6 million gross profit for 2023
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/windey-energy/
Overview: Another veteran of the wind power scene, state-owned Windey installed 10.1 to 10.4 GW capacity in 2023, earning it third place in China and fourth place worldwide. It has installed over 600 wind farms, most of them in China; within the country, Windey claims to have achieved a market share of 13%.
Mingyang
- Location: China
- Founded: 1993
- Number of employees: 10,000+
- Current funding level: about $419 million gross profit for 2023
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/mingyangsmartenergy/
Overview: Mingyang ranked fifth in terms of 2023 installations and project commissions, at 9.9 GW and 9.0 GW, respectively. It’s become especially prolific with its offshore installations, doubling these to 3 GW last year to become the largest offshore turbine supplier in the world (according to BloombergNEF). It claims to have over 55 GW of installed capacity.
Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy
- Location: Spain/Germany
- Founded: 2017 (via a merger of Gamesa Corporación Tecnológica, S.A. and Siemens’ wind power division)
- Number of employees: roughly 23,200 (according to data provided by Reuters)
- Current funding level: €4.3 billion loss for 2023
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/siemensgamesa/
Overview: Siemens Gamesa had a tough time of it in 2023, but nevertheless installed 9.7 GW of wind power (probably helped by the €12 billion subsidy it received from the German government, according to Clean Energy Wire). In 2022, it dominated offshore, capturing 13% of the non-Chinese market. As of 2022, it had at least 750 GW in installed capacity both on- and offshore.
Top Wind Turbine Companies in the USA
General Electric Vernova
- Location: US
- Founded: 2024 (when GE Vernova was established as an independent spin-off from GE Aerospace and GE Healthcare)
- Number of employees: around 75,000
- Current funding level: $1.28 billion for 2024’s second quarter
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gevernova/
Overview: A big chunk of the newly independent GE Vernova’s duties is wind power; it has 55,000 turbines installed (almost all of them onshore) and had 8.1 GW in commissioned capacity in 2023, higher than Siemens Gamesa. It’s the clear leader in the American scene, hoovering up 57% of the onshore US market in 2023.
NextEra Energy Resources
- Location: US
- Founded: 2000
- Number of employees: 15,300 (total for NextEra Energy)
- Current funding level: net income of $966 million for 2023
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/nextera-energy-resources/
Overview: NextEra Energy Resources (NEER), a subsidiary of NextEra Energy, has quite a portfolio of projects; in addition to wind, it’s involved in solar, nuclear, energy storage, and natural gas. It has 119 wind projects going in the US and Canada; as of 2022, these had a net generating capacity of about 18.9 GW.
Top Wind Energy Startups
Vortex Bladeless
- Location: Spain
- Founded: 2013
- Number of employees: unknown
- Current funding level: a total of $1.98 million raised (according to Pitchbook)
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/vortexbladeless/
Overview: At first glance, Vortex’s big idea just looks like a stick in the ground – but it’s not just any stick. When wind flows around it, it creates alternating vortexes on either side of the pole. The turbine – which, the company notes, isn’t really a turbine – is designed to sway with these patterns, and the oscillations are what create the electricity. Though the system is less powerful than traditional blade-wielding turbines, it’s quieter, simpler, and less dangerous to wildlife. The tech is still being trialed and is not yet on the market.
Aeromine
- Location: US
- Founded: 2021
- Number of employees: unknown
- Current funding level: a total of $12.3 million raised (according to Pitchbook)
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/aeromine-technologies/
Overview: If your company doesn’t fancy a set of solar panels, Aeromine might have an alternative: a system of couch-sized machines that sit on the roof and collect energy from the wind. The gadgets are designed to capture and accelerate incoming wind, creating a low-pressure zone near the bottom, where a propeller is located. When air is sucked into this zone and into the propeller, electricity is created. The higher the building and wind, the more energy you get; Aeromine claims that ten of these units on a 25-meter-tall building can, depending on average wind speed, generate up to 160 MWh a year.
Read also: Top 5 Green Tech Startups in 2024
Challenges and Opportunities for Wind Energy Sector
As renewable energy goes, wind isn’t too much of a headache; it’s relatively cost-effective and isn’t too limited geographically. This is significant for countries or areas desiring energy independence as well as decarbonization.
But the wind still has its issues. For one, it’s difficult to integrate into the grid since the wind doesn’t follow a reliable pattern, leading to imbalances. Also, the monstrous turbines used today are noisy and must be installed in remote areas, requiring infrastructure investments to transport and store the electricity in addition to the costs of the turbines themselves. That can get pricey fast. In Europe especially, long wait times for permits to connect to the grid are choking the local wind industry. And to top it off, the big blades endanger local birds and bats.
The Future of Wind Energy Companies
Problematic or not, the wind energy companies have a good thing going for it. But that’s not to say it won’t change, though. The International Energy Agency predicts that onshore turbines will continue to make up the bulk of wind energy in the future, but that offshore is ‘expected to grow rapidly’ – for good reason. While offshore wind farms are expensive and more of a hassle to install, they aren’t affected by the aesthetic and environmental restrictions that limit the size and scope of onshore installations. Offshore farms also benefit from faster, more reliable winds out at sea. These become stronger the further out to sea you go, so ‘floating’ farms – in waters too deep for turbines to sit on the seafloor – are potentially ‘game-changing,’ according to a report by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA). Onshore, turbines might become bigger and quieter (according to a study focusing on American companies’ trends). Startups’ futures are less certain; while their smaller designs can be handy for domestic or company use, their predicted output (so far) is negligible compared to that of large-scale wind farms.
But even large-scale deployments might not be enough for the planet. The IEA estimates that wind and solar would have to make up 70% of energy use by 2050 to achieve net-zero goals. Achieving this would require installing 390 GW’s worth of wind power a year by 2030: more than triple 2023’s record installations of 117 GW. And while wind energy is on the up, private and public initiatives are still behind in their efforts to reach these goals, so the IEA. Governmental policies like China’s 14th Five-Year Plan for Renewable Energy and the US’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) are the driving forces behind wind energy, but additional support for integration and better bureaucracy is dearly needed. So while wind energy might not be perfect, it has the power to save the world. The only question is whether it can get there fast enough.
