Wind power sees 12 pct world market share in 2020
Wind energy, which produces neither the greenhouse gases of fossil fuels nor the radioactive waste of nuclear power, currently only provides 0.4 percent of the world's electricity and most of that is in Germany, Denmark and Spain.
But the European Wind Energy Association said the industry could grow that quickly if the right incentives were put in place, expanding the sector from a seven billion euros business to one worth 75 billion euros the year by 2020.
The EWEA wants governments to set themselves binding targets to increase the use of wind power, to remove subsidies to competing sectors like coal and nuclear and to ensure wind farms have fair access to energy grids.
The forecast, set out in a report by the EWEA and environmental group Greenpeace, is much more optimistic than one by the International Energy Agency (IEA), which sees a much smaller increase in the market share for "renewables" like wind.
In a report last year, the IEA, which monitors global energy trends for the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, said all renewable electricity sources other than hydro would account for only three percent of world consumption by 2020, up from two percent in 2000.
Overall electricity generation would grow 2.6 percent per year, it said.
Wind power's advocates say the demand for power that does not produce carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas blamed for causing global warming, will increase as the Kyoto Protocol on climate change takes effect.