Wind energy is a virtually carbon-free and pollution-free electricity source, with global wind resources greatly exceeding electricity demand. Accordingly, the installed capacity of wind turbines grew at an annualized rate of >20% from 2000 to 2019 and is projected to increase by a further 50% by the end of 2023. In this Review, we describe the factors that dictate the wind resource magnitude and variability and illustrate the tools and techniques that are being used to make projections of wind resources and wind turbine operating conditions. Natural variability due to the action of internal climate modes appears to dominate over global-warming-induced non-stationarity over most areas with large wind energy installations or potential. However, there is evidence for increased wind energy resources by the end of the current century in northern Europe and the US Southern Great Plains. New technology trends are changing the sensitivity of wind energy to global climate non-stationarity and, thus, present new challenges and opportunities for innovative research. The evolution of climate modelling to increasingly address mesoscale processes is providing improved projections of both wind resources and wind turbine operating conditions, and will contribute to continued reductions in the levelized cost of energy from wind power generation.

风能实际上是一种无碳，无污染的能源，全球风能资源大大超过了电力需求。因此，从2000年到2019年，风力涡轮机的装机容量以每年20％的速度增长，并且预计到2023年底将进一步增加50％。在本综述中，我们描述了决定风力资源的因素。大小和可变性，并说明了用于预测风资源和风力涡轮机运行状况的工具和技术。在大多数具有大型风能装置或潜力的地区，由于内部气候模式的作用而导致的自然变异似乎在全球变暖引起的非平稳性中占主导地位。然而，有证据表明，到本世纪末，北欧和美国南部大平原的风能资源将会增加。新技术趋势正在改变风能对全球气候不稳定的敏感性，从而为创新研究提出了新的挑战和机遇。随着气候模型的发展，越来越多地涉及中尺度过程，这为风力资源和风力涡轮机的运行状况提供了更好的预测，并将有助于持续降低风力发电的平均成本。