A REVIEW STUDY ON TRENDS TO WIND ENERGY IN A GLOBAL AND THAILAND CONTEXT

Energy plays a vital role in the development of a country. Global energy consumption was 11164 Mtoe in 2009 while global electricity generation reached 20093.6 Tetra watt-hours. Renewable energy sources are promoted globally due to the limited storage, unstable price, and emissions of fossil fuels. In turn, 47% of new power plants that were added globally during 2008-2009 were for renewable energy sources. Wind energy has been one of the emerging renewable energy sources in the last few years. Global installed capacity reached 159.21 GW at the end of 2009 which contributed around 2% of the global electricity consumption. Demand for energy is also increasing yearly in Thailand and energy consumption reached 66339 Ktoe at the end of 2009. More than 2000 GWh of electricity is imported every year into Thailand where there has recently been only 5.4 MW of wind power installed capacity. However, the government of Thailand has planned to increase wind energy installed capacity to 800 MW by 2022.