New Global Wind Atlas Launched

On the 28th of November, the World Bank and the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) launched the new Global Wind Atlas, a free web-based tool to help policymakers and investors identify promising areas for wind power generation, virtually anywhere in the world.

The Global Wind Atlas is expected to help governments save millions of dollars by avoiding the need for early-stage, national-level wind mapping. It will also allow to compare resource potential between areas in one region or across countries.

The new tool is based on the latest modeling technologies, which combine wind climate data with high-resolution terrain information—factors that can influence the wind, such as hills or valleys—and provides wind climate data at a 1km scale. This yields more reliable information on wind potential. The tool also provides access to high-resolution global and regional maps and geographic information system (GIS) data.

This tool will help governments assess their resource potential and understand how wind can fit into their energy mix.

The work was funded by the Energy Sector Management Assistance Program(ESMAP), a multi-donor trust fund administered by the World Bank, in close partnership with DTU Wind Energy.