Gross wind power capacity additions across the European Union rose by 20% to a record 15.7GW last year, bringing the total net installed capacity on the continent to 169GW, driven by a massive build-up in the UK and Germany.

Wind energy remains Europe’s second largest form of power generation capacity, closely approaching that of natural gas installations, WindEurope said pointing to fresh figures for last year.

Out of the total, 12.53GW were installed onshore, and a further 3.15GW offshore, with both figures being a record. Wind power accounted for 55% of total power capacity installations, and now makes up 18% of the EU’s total installed power generation capacity.

“That it was a record year reflects the fact that a lot of the new projects were ‘pushed through the gates’ to benefit from feed-in-tariffs and other old support schemes while they still applied. This was especially the case in Germany with its 5GW of new onshore, and was also true for the UK and France,” WindEurope chief executive Giles Dickson said.

Gross additions reached 6.6GW in Germany, driven by record onshore additions ahead of an end in 2018 to new projects gaining feed-in tariffs, and 4.3GW in the UK, pushed higher by new offshore installations as the support framework (ROCs – Renewable Obligation Certificates) came to an end.

France with 1.7GW also had an installation record, while thinly populated Finland followed suit with a remarkable 577MW in additions.

Belgium (476MW), Ireland (426MW) and Croatia (147MW) also had installation records last year. Non-EU member Turkey saw 766MW in wind additions.

Poland with only 41MW in additions experienced a steep fall from 1.2GW in new installations a year earlier as a damaging distance rule for onshore wind kicked in.

Denmark remained the country with the largest share of wind energy as part of its electricity demand, while that share surged to 20% in Germany last year from 16% a year earlier, WindEurope pointed out.

Despite the remarkable additions, WindEurope’s Dickson stressed that the medium and longer term outlook for wind remains uncertain.

“The transition to auctions has been messier than we hoped. And crucially we lack clarity from many governments on their ambitions for renewables post-2020,” Dickson said.

“Countries need to start clarifying how much wind energy they want to deploy in the future. This will give visibility to the industry, allowing us to plan ahead and reduce costs. And it will allow others such as transmission system operators to plan the necessary infrastructure build-out.”

The wind industry won’t invest in Europe’s economy if the market prospects are not there, he cautioned.

Last year also saw 640MW of wind power decommissioned across the EU.