The Scandinavian nation is setting the global bar for harnessing wind energy: It’s been announced that Denmark broke a world energy record, using wind turbines to generate 42% of the country’s electricity in 2015.


Those figures are the highest of their kind for any country, according to Energinet, the Danish national electricity operator. In 2014, wind generated 39% of Denmark’s electricity, which was also a world record.

A big factor in Denmark’s latest record-breaking achievement, however, was that 2015 was an unusually windy year, Energinet says. Still, wind power share of Danish energy consumption has gone up annually every year since 2008, a clear signal that Denmark’s doing something right—it aims to produce half its electricity with renewable resources by 2020.


And progress is going swimmingly. Last July, Denmark’s wind farms produced so much energy that they outstripped national demand, churning out 140% of expected output. Let Denmark’s commitment to green energy be a lesson to the rest of our fuel-strapped world.

[Energinet]

Image: AP Photo/Lars Skaaning, Polfoto