A Policy Brief for the Sri Lankan Government: A Call to Re-evaluate Wind Energy Strategies for a Sustainable Future

  • By Hiran Daluwatta

Sri Lanka’s pursuit of clean energy is vital, but its current enthusiasm for large-scale wind farms warrants immediate and critical reassessment. Scientific evidence, coupled with Sri Lanka’s unique national context, indicates that wind energy may not be the optimal solution for achieving long-term energy security and sustainable development. Continuing down this path risks misallocating resources, hindering genuine progress, and potentially causing irreversible environmental and socio-economic harm as follows;

  1. The Undeniable Constraint of Inconsistent and Weak Winds:

The viability of wind energy depends heavily on the consistency and intensity of wind speeds. According to the Sri Lanka Sustainable Energy Authority (SLSEA) and multiple wind resource assessments conducted in collaboration with institutions like the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL, USA), most regions in Sri Lanka exhibit only marginally viable wind speeds.

Wind power generation is most efficient when wind speeds are between 6.5 and 9 meters per second (m/s) at a turbine hub height of 80–100 meters. In Sri Lanka, with the exception of narrow coastal belts such as Mannar, Puttalam, and parts of Hambantota, the average wind speeds fall below this optimal threshold. Even in the most promising zones, average wind speeds fluctuate significantly on a seasonal basis, primarily due to the bi-monsoonal climate and complex terrain.

This temporal and spatial variability results in poor capacity factors—a key performance metric in wind energy. For instance, while wind farms in Denmark or Texas achieve capacity factors of 35–45%, Sri Lankan wind farms often perform at 20–25%, leading to low efficiency and questionable returns on investment.

  1. The Looming Uncertainty of Monsoons and Climate Change:

Sri Lanka’s location in the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) brings intense, seasonal monsoonal shifts, causing highly variable wind patterns, both in speed and direction, making forecasting and grid planning exceptionally difficult.

Recent climate model projections from the IPCC’s Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) warn of increasing atmospheric instability in South Asia, leading to even more erratic wind regimes. Ignoring this scientific consensus is perilous. Depending on a power source projected to become more unreliable due to climate change jeopardizes energy and economic stability. This increased variability will undermine wind yield predictions and grid integration reliability, especially during peak demand.

  1. The Prohibitive Cost of Land Scarcity and Lost Potential:

Unlike versatile solar power, wind turbines demand vast land tracts due to spacing requirements. A typical utility-scale wind farm needs at least 10 hectares per MW. In our densely populated island, this presents a crippling opportunity cost. Viable wind areas like Mannar are often ecologically sensitive or agriculturally crucial. Pursuing large-scale wind farms here will inevitably cause displacement, biodiversity loss, and long-term socio-environmental damage. Sacrificing vital land for a questionable energy solution is unsustainable.

  1. The Heavy Burden of Grid Integration and Transmission Losses:

Sri Lanka’s transmission infrastructure is heavily centralized, radiating outward from a few large substations concentrated around Colombo and other major cities. Wind farms, however, are often located in peripheral, less-developed regions such as the North-Western and South-Eastern coasts. Integrating these remote wind farms into the national grid necessitates expensive transmission upgrades and incurs substantial transmission losses.

Studies conducted by the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) highlight that wind power in peripheral zones imposes significant costs on the national grid due to reactive power compensation, frequency management challenges, and load balancing difficulties. These technical hurdles further diminish the economic viability of wind energy in the Sri Lankan context.

  1. The Irreversible Threat to Migratory Bird Routes:

Sri Lanka lies along the Central Asian Flyway, a critical migratory path. Research by ornithologists and organizations like BirdLife International has shown that wind turbines, especially in the Mannar region, pose a severe threat to avian biodiversity through collisions and habitat fragmentation and noise pollution. Scaling up wind farms in these vital ecological zones violates international conservation obligations. Prioritizing a flawed energy solution at the expense of our natural heritage is unacceptable.

In light of Sri Lanka’s obligations under international conventions such as the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), scaling up wind farms without robust ecological safeguards could breach both ethical and legal responsibilities.

  1. The Peril of Economic and Technological Dependence:

Unlike solar technology -which benefits from rapid cost declines, easy scalability, and modular deployment- wind power in Sri Lanka often requires foreign-built turbines, specialized maintenance crews, and bespoke logistical arrangements (such as port facilities for heavy blade shipments). This leads to capital and technological lock-in, where Sri Lanka remains dependent on external providers for decades. Furthermore, many current wind power development models are tied to outdated feed-in tariffs or public-private partnership structures that no longer reflect global best practices. Entrenching ourselves in long-term economic and technological dependence through a suboptimal energy choice is a strategic error.

Conclusion: Embracing a Brighter, Context-Appropriate Energy Future:

Sri Lanka’s renewable energy future lies in more adaptable, efficient, and context-sensitive technologies. Solar PV – through rooftops and agrivoltaics – combined with battery storage, smart grids, and pumped hydro storage, offers a scientifically sound and economically sustainable path. These solutions align with Sri Lanka’s abundant solar resource, land-use priorities, and offer greater scalability and resilience.

The scientific, environmental, and systemic evidence is clear: wind energy is not the right renewable energy strategy for Sri Lanka. The government must urgently reassess its approach and decisively prioritize more suitable, future-proof renewable energy solutions like solar power. Continuing down the wind farm path is a costly diversion that will hinder Sri Lanka’s progress towards a truly sustainable energy future.