New reports now show that plans for a new wind farm are set to make Maldives the country with the highest proportion of renewable energy in the whole world
The country is proposing a 30 turbine wind farm that will be located close to Male its capital. This wind farm will be able to deliver 75 megawatts of electricity when at full capacity. This is enough power to provide electricity to the whole capital, surrounding resorts, and the airport. Any excess power will be used to run desalination plants that will produce bottled drinking water from the sea.
If this wind farm is built, then the project will mean that, per head of population, Maldives will be getting about six times more electricity from wind than the UK. The British Climate change expert that helped Maldives develop its draft of the project, Mark Lynas, says that he welcomes the wind farm proposal. He went on to say that it could be a signal for the rest of the world.
He went on to say that if a middle income country can cut its emissions by a quarter through standard commercial partnerships, then the rest of the world has very little excuse for saying that carbon reduction is too expensive. The Maldives government is taking the leading climate change in an effort to push larger states into taking more action.
The $200 million wind farm project is being financed and built by the Falcon Energy group. It will use turbines from the American company GE, which is one of the world’s leaders in wind energy. The project is said to get its start with a year long analysis of wind conditions to assess the best arrangement for the turbines.