The Northeast region of Brazil is widely known by the natural beauty of its beaches, warm climate, people hospitality, quiet sea and exceptional wind conditions for sailing. But the last one has been responsible for a real revolution in the local economy. What seemed to be a simple factor of leisure has turned out to be a huge economic potential drawing the attention of multinational energy companies committed to clean and sustainable power generations.
Back in 2009 when the first wind energy bid was held by the federal government, the installed capacity boomed from mere 601MW to 6,6GW in 2014 according to ONS (National Operator of Electric System), coming to a total of 285 wind farms and more than 40,000 jobs created in the last year only.
Nowadays 30.6% of the energy generated in the region comes from wind farms against thermoelectric (35.7%) and hydroelectric (33.7%) power plants. Although less favorable on wind conditions, other regions such as Southeast and South can definitely contribute to feed the national power grid with clean energy as well. The wind power generation already represents about 5% of the total energy produced in Brazil as stated by Aneel (government agency).
Just to have an idea of the immense road of opportunities to be covered ahead, EPE (Electric Research Institute) has reported that 1,055 projects have been signed up for the next energy bid that will be held in February 2nd, 2016. Surprisingly 864 of them (45%) are addressed to wind farms nationwide.
The technology evolution, the current hydro crisis, the awareness of green energy benefits, and the outstanding geographic and climate conditions of its territory have offered the country an unprecedented possibility of transformation on its economic and social aspects.
That scenario has greatly fomented local innovation with companies such as Tecsis and WEG gaining national and international market projections while producing wind blades and machine systems.
Needless to say that wind farms have been blowing the current Brazilian macroeconomic crisis far away from their market. The plain sailing will be achieved with the upcoming off-shore platforms in a very near future.
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