China is progressing according to target with its plans for producing over 25pc of its total electricity from wind energy by 2030. Figures suggest that this could further increase to almost 33pc as the country's market continues to reform. Within the next decade a huge amount of fresh generation capacity for clean energy is coming online in China - a planned amount that will exceed the total American investment to date - and this will help the country's bid to be seen as a 'green' economy.

The findings were published in Nature Energy. The Chinese government has already said that it intends to grow its total wind capacity by a factor of three to five in the next 14 years, and it is now already a leader in the field by a significant margin with 145GW of installed capacity, some of which is yet to be connected to the grid.

However, the Chinese bid to become an environmentally friendly leader still needs more work, as the country leads the way in the field of greenhouse gases - topping the C02 league table by still producing over 70pc of its power from fossil fuels.

WindEurope, the trade body for the European wind energy industry, said that the EU would need to step up and agree on long-term development policies if it wished to remain a forerunner in the race to become a truly renewable economy. With the right policies, the EU would be able to achieve 25pc of its total energy needs from wind power.

Chinese investment in renewables will likely now take second place to the more pressing concern of integrating existing wind capacity by investing in the right infrastructure and a transmission system that can deal with variable energy flows.