Home to Turkey’s first wind power plant, Turkey's Aegean province of İzmir is estimated to have the capacity to produce 15 billion euros' worth of wind turbines by 2023.

İzmir, with a wind turbine capacity that reached 1,549 megawatts (MW) at the end of last year, is expected to reach 2,000 MW in two years, Anadolu Agency (AA) reported Sunday, citing the Wind Energy Statistics Report 2019 prepared by the Turkish Wind Energy Association (TÜREB).

The Aegean province's location and functionality are ideal as it is within a couple of hours of maintenance, repair and service providers and can serve 65% of the installed wind power capacity in Turkey. The report notes that the city, which has an export volume of $10.2 billion and an import volume of $7.5 billion, holds 9.3% of the industrial production in Turkey and has a labor force of 2.5 million.

Positioned at the heart of a market of about 1.5 billion consumers, İzmir is a natural distribution center thanks to its strategic ports and its location at the intersection of Europe, Central Asia and the Middle East. Thus, companies have the opportunity to easily transmit their products to Russia, Europe, North Africa and the Middle East through the ports in the city.

İzmir Development Agency (İZKA) Secretary-General Mehmet Yavuz said İzmir and the surrounding provinces, Balıkesir, Çanakkale and Manisa account for 50% of Turkey's wind power capacity in the region. "İzmir and its surroundings lead our country in this sense. The contribution of these positive developments in terms of energy production in the wind energy sector to our country's economy and the environment is quite valuable," he said.

Yavuz further pointed out that the new business opportunities created by the wind industry, the manufacturing industry and services sector are just as important. "For this reason, we consider investments in the manufacture of hundreds of hardware and parts that make up the components used in wind turbine construction as an important opportunity for our country and regional economies," Yavuz added.

According to the TÜREB report, Turkey added 687 MW of installed capacity in 2019 to its wind power portfolio, generating a total of 8,056 MW from the renewable source. According to the data, wind energy provided about 8 million Turkish homes with electricity last year.

More than 75% of wind farms are located in the Aegean and Marmara regions of Turkey, the report revealed. Some 12.3% of wind farms are located in the Mediterranean region. The remaining are located in different parts of the country.

Turkey currently operates a total of 198 wind energy power plants. The country has 25 wind farms under construction that will total 1,309 MW, the report read.

According to the Energy and Natural Resources Ministry, Turkey has a wind potential worth an estimated 48,000 MW. The country is gradually expanding its capacity, mainly in the Aegean and Marmara regions. The country aims to add 10,000 MW of wind power capacity in the next 10 years.