IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - May/June 2021 - 96

tinkerers also experimented with
the emergent wind power technologies, and this wind power innovation
was encouraged by the state. During
1919-1926, the Danish association for
the use of wind power was granted state
support, and the Danish State evaluated

the energy effic ie n c y of t h e m o s t
common wind turbines at the time.
With a 43% efficiency rate in harvesting
the power of wind, the propeller wind
turbine was ranked as the best. Practical and theoretical wind power-related
research topics were debated enthusiasti-

table 1. Timeline: A brief history of wind power in Denmark.

96	

Year

Key Events and Political Decisions

1891

Wind turbine by Poul la Cour

1903

Danish Wind Electricity Company (D.V.E.S.) founded

1914

1914-1918: World War I

1919

Wind turbine with aerodynamic wings; design J. Jensen and P. Vinding

1939

1939-1945: World War II

1950

The Vester Egesborg turbine

1952

Application for Marshall Plan support for wind power research

1963

Silent Spring, book by Rachel Carson

1973

90% of the total national energy consumption based on imported oil

1973

First international energy crisis

1976

Danish Energy Agency established

1978

The Tvind turbine, the largest in the world at the time

1979

Second international energy crisis

1979

Public protests against nuclear power

1979

Danish Energy Policy 1979

1985

Parliamentary decision: " no " to nuclear

1987

The Brundtland Report

1990

Energy 2000, the first plan for low-carbon energy transitions in the world

1991

Vindeby Offshore Wind Farm, the first offshore wind farm in the world

1992

United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change

1997

The Kyoto Protocol implements objectives of the United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change

2000

13% of the total national electricity consumption supplied by wind power

2004

Energy Agreement

2006

An Inconvenient Truth, book by Al Gore

2008

2008-2011: Energy Agreement and Renewable Energy Act

2010

Anholt Offshore Wind Farm; the largest in the world at the time

2012

2012-2018: Energy Agreement

2015

Paris Agreement signed by 197 countries

2018

46.9% of the total national electricity consumption supplied by wind power

2018

Energy Agreement

2019

Climate Act

ieee power & energy magazine	

The Danes
have harvested
wind power
for centuries,
and various
early windpowered
technologies
have been
popular
throughout
history.
cally in the national engineering journal
The Engineer (in Danish: Ingeniøren).
See Figures 2 and 3.

Postwar Enthusiasm
During World War II, wind turbines
again provided a welcome source of
power as energy resources were scarce.
However, general interest in wind power dwindled quickly as energy imports
normalized after the war.
After the shock of war, agricultural, medical, and technological advances generated optimism about the
future. The collective experiences of
wartime resource and energy scarcity
served as a reminder of fuel dependency. The Danish government set out
to develop and improve the electricity
grid, prioritized coal imports for centralized electricity generation, and
accepted hydropower from Norway.
However, importing coal proved challenging under the postwar political
frictions: coal imports from the Eastern Bloc countries proved unstable,
and coal imports from the Western
Bloc countries were costly.
The economists in the Organisation
for European Economic Co-operation
rightly predicted that the European reconstruction work after the war would
lack sufficient energy resources, and they
discussed the use of wind power as an
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