Türkiye aims to expand its wind energy potential as part of the focus on carbon-free energy resources, a senior official said Tuesday, noting it is possible to advance in this direction through progress in wind turbine technologies and investments.

"With the wind energy potential atlas whose update we have completed, and new technologies and investments, we stated that it is possible to increase our current potential to 150,000 MW," Energy and Natural Resources Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said on X, formerly Twitter.

Speaking during the 12th two-day Turkish Wind Energy Congress (TWEC) held in Istanbul, the minister announced the completion of the Wind Energy Potential Atlas update, emphasizing the importance of meeting the growing demand for carbon-free energy sources.

He mentioned that despite a 27% reduction in primary energy intensity over the past 20 years, demand has doubled.

"We predict that it will increase by more than 3% annually in the next 20 years," he added.

Bayraktar noted that the share of electricity in the final energy demand is estimated to increase to 30% in the next 20 years and mentioned several priorities they have outlined for the transformation in the electricity sector, including energy efficiency, renewable energy, nuclear power, natural gas as a transitional fuel, hydrogen, storage technologies, digitalization and critical minerals.

He also highlighted the need for international access to finance, technology development and localization, and capacity building to develop these priority areas.

Bayraktar stated that carbon-free energy sources came to the fore in meeting the increasing demand and said, "To utilize solar and wind energy at the highest possible level, it is needed to make the necessary investment in supportive technologies like transmission and distribution grids, storage, hydrogen, support global supply chain diversity and domestic technology development."

Regarding wind energy, Bayraktar mentioned that Türkiye has 11,609 megawatts (MW) of installed wind power capacity, with an annual revenue of approximately 2 billion euros ($2.13 billion), covering around 11% of the country's electricity demand.

"The global average share of wind energy in total production is 7.5%. In other words, the potential we use in our country is more than the world average," he said.

"However, there is even more untapped potential and the goal is to increase the share of wind energy to meet 25% of the country's electricity demand within 20 years," the minister noted.

Bayraktar highlighted the need for improvements, reforms and new regulations in various areas to achieve these goals.

He also mentioned that over 28,000 megawatts of capacity have been allocated but have not yet been put into operation and that they aim to commission this capacity in a short period.

"According to the updated atlas data, we estimate that our wind potential is approximately 100,000 megawatts under current technology and conditions and that it can reach up to 150,000 megawatts thanks to developments in wind turbine technologies. Considering our current installed capacity, this potential means an additional capacity of approximately 140,000 megawatts. This corresponds to an additional investment of $140 billion in present figures," he explained.

Bayraktar also pointed out that thanks to the support provided through the Renewable Energy Support Scheme (YEKDEM), the components of wind energy plants, such as generators, blades, towers and tower connection elements, are produced in Türkiye.

Moreover, 80% of blade and turbine tower assembly in Türkiye is exported to global markets. He mentioned that the wind energy sector has created approximately 25,000 green jobs in the country.