South Africa needed long-term renewable energy targets, a clear, investor friendly regulatory environment and transparent grid connection and queuing processes, if it was to make the most of its plentiful wind energy resources, said Mainstream Renewable Power CE Dr Eddie O'Connor.

"Mainstream is prepared to invest large quantities of capital to build these sustainable energy assets," said O'Connor.

"We are very encouraged by the government's work to date to promote renewable energies," he added.

A recent technical study undertaken to estimate the scale of the country's wind resource showed that South Africa has enough economically viable wind energy sites to generate 184-Terawatt hours (TWh) of indigenous, sustainable energy.

Mainstream Renewable Power South Africa (MRPSA) released the results of the analysis, which used Geographic Information System (GIS) technology and a Mesoscale wind flow model.

Electricity demand in South Africa stood at around 250 TWh, supplied from 44 GW of installed capacity. Demand was expected to grow to 80 GW by 2025, said MRPSA. The country is also currently the twelfth biggest producer of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions per capita in the world, and emissions were set to quadruple by 2050 if "drastic measures" were not taken.

The study modeled the entire surface area of the country using GIS technology, which assesses a variety of inputs including terrain elevation, wind speed, grid line locations and urban areas, and outputs the areas where wind farms can be constructed.

The company believed that up to 5 GW of wind power could be built within a five-year period, which would generate 13 TWh, or about 5% of the country's current electricity demand.

Strong public and government commitment combined with the right regulatory environment, wind power could easily reach 25% of the country's current electricity demand by 2025, similar to what is happening in many other international markets, added MRPSA.

"This study, once again, proves that we have a significant wind resource in the country. In order to deliver on our long-term energy future we need to take immediate action. If government is serious about reaching its renewable energy targets and finding a cost effective solution to bolster our ailing power supply, the potential contribution from wind power projects cannot be ignored," said South African Wind Energy Association deputy chairperson Mark Tanton.

He said that power utility Eskom had received applications in excess of 10 500 MW for grid connections for wind power projects in South Africa.

"Once the issues around accessing the power purchase agreement are resolved, the 28 developers who have lodged these applications would be more than capable of bringing a minimum of 4 000 MW into the system by 2013," added Tanton.

South Africa aims to generate 10 000 GWh using renewable energy sources by 2013.

MRPSA spokesperson David Chown said that the country could not "afford to ignore the potential of its vast wind energy resource".

"We need to introduce at least 36 GW of new energy capacity over the next 15 years and by using our own natural resources to plug this gap we will not only reduce our CO2 emissions by over 68-million tons each year, but we'll create a whole new economic industry, particularly in rural areas, generating new jobs and empowering local communities through education, training and skills transfer," he said.

"There's nothing new to this. There's already 150 GW of wind energy installed around the globe and its growing by 30 GW a year, employing over 400 000 people worldwide. This is a highly reliable, competitive and scalable form of power generation with zero long-term fuel risks and highly predictable long-term power generation capabilities," emphasised O'Connor.

MRPSA said that the study identified suitable areas as land with an expected long-term mean wind speed greater than 7 m a second at 80 m above ground level. Exclusion zones, or buffers, were set around certain features to take into account considerations including safety, environmental, noise and radar interference.

Wind speeds were estimated using a Mesoscale wind flow model, which is a mathematical model of the atmosphere, which calculates wind flow across a very wide area using observations from a variety of meteorological sources.

The power output of each wind farm would vary depending on the local wind resource, however the company expects a capacity factor in the range of 30% to 35% to be typical for the sites studied.

A figure of 5 MW/km² was used, as experience demonstrated that not all land was suited for wind turbine construction, MRPSA noted.