Wind Power Sector Seizes Mega Opportunity with High-Growth Beta and Structural Alpha

Stock News03-18

A research report from CITIC SEC indicates that following the conclusion of the recent Two Sessions, the terms "green fuel" and "computing-power coordination" were included in the government work report, aligning with China's energy independence strategy and AI competition strategy. Driven by the dual rigid high-growth demands for green fuel production and green power supply for data centers, it is projected that these two demands could generate nearly 465 GW of wind turbine demand by 2030, fueling a super cycle in the wind power sector. The focus should be on wind power companies with green fuel production capacity and turbine manufacturers with export capabilities to Europe. Calculations show that wind power, as the core green electricity source for green fuel, accounts for over 53% of the cost structure. Wind power companies transitioning into green fuel operators possess significant upstream cost advantages and align with the national energy security strategy, which is expected to lift their reasonable PE valuation multiples. Valuations are anticipated to rise from around 20x PE for traditional wind equipment manufacturing to over 30-35x PE for core operators central to national energy security. Leading enterprises could achieve even higher valuation premiums, up to 40x PE. The wind turbine sector is experiencing a dual uplift in both valuation and profit benchmarks, spurred by the green energy strategy and computing-power coordination strategy, which together create highly profitable and certain downstream demand. The wind power industry is encountering a mega opportunity characterized by high-growth beta and structural alpha. Catalyzed by rising sector valuations, improving profitability, and strong downstream demand growth, the industry's prosperity continues its upward trajectory. The main viewpoints from CITIC SEC are as follows: The positioning of green fuel is crucial for national energy security and aims to substitute crude oil. According to the National Energy Administration, in 2025, China's large-scale industrial crude oil production was only 216 million tons, while crude oil imports reached 578 million tons, resulting in apparent crude oil consumption of 791 million tons. The external dependence rate for crude oil was as high as 72.7%, an increase of 0.7 percentage points year-on-year, indicating growing pressure for energy self-sufficiency. With the outbreak of geopolitical conflicts involving Iran, the urgency of the energy independence strategy has intensified. Statistics from the Xiangchenghui Research Institute show that by the end of 2025, China's total planned green methanol production capacity (including signed agreements) reached 64.86 million tons, and the total planned Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) capacity was nearly 8 million tons. If all this planned capacity is realized, it could substitute for 53.34 million tons of crude oil functionality, accounting for 9.2% of 2025's crude oil imports, essentially meeting the interim target of substituting 10% of imported crude oil. The commissioning of this capacity and the associated earnings release over the next 2-3 years are considered highly certain. According to Xiangchenghui Research Institute estimates, replacing all imported oil functionality would require approximately 2000 GW to 2700 GW of new energy installation capacity. The demand to substitute 10% of crude oil imports alone would generate nearly 250 GW of wind power installation demand. Computing-power coordination continues to catalyze green power demand for data centers. Qin Haiyan, Secretary-General of the Chinese Wind Energy Association (CWEA), pointed out that the deep integration of computing power and green power is an industry trend, and data center electricity demand will maintain rapid growth. China's data center rack scale exceeded 9 million units in 2025 and is projected to surpass 33 million units by 2030. Over the next five years, the annual new electricity consumption of data centers will exceed 380 billion kWh, requiring supporting wind power installation of 175 GW. With the impending establishment of the National Data Group, it is estimated that China's actual data center energy consumption by 2030 will be higher than the previously expected 400 billion kWh (corresponding to a 46 GW load), with the actual electricity load potentially reaching 60-65 GW, corresponding to a supporting wind power demand of nearly 190 GW. Demand for computing-power coordination in Europe is accelerating. The UK's cancellation of wind power supply chain tariffs benefits Chinese wind power companies. The UK government announced that starting April 1, 2026, it will formally cancel import tariffs on 33 wind power components, including reducing tariffs on wind turbine blades from 6% to 0% and on cables from 2% to 0%. This move aims to unlock approximately £22 billion in investment and accelerate offshore wind installation, reflecting both strong local electricity demand and a significant gap in the domestic wind power supply chain, while also opening an important incremental market for China's wind power industry chain. According to the European Data Centre Association (EUDCA), Europe's data center electricity consumption is expected to reach around 38 GW by 2030, rising further to 40 GW by 2031, corresponding to nearly 85 GW of new wind power demand. If Chinese companies can capture 30% of the market share, the incremental demand from European computing-power coordination alone could contribute approximately 25 GW of high-margin offshore wind orders for domestic companies around 2030. Wind power is the segment with defined elasticity and returns in both green fuel and computing-power coordination scenarios. Electrolyzers for green hydrogen production and data centers both impose extremely high requirements for power supply reliability, needing to reach 99.99%. Current mainstream green power supply solutions in China and Europe utilize a model of over-provisioning wind power coupled with energy storage to achieve stable supply, with 1 GW of load requiring 3 GW of wind power capacity. From an economic perspective, wind power's average annual utilization hours can reach 2,200 hours, and the storage-to-load ratio for the wind-plus-storage route is only 1:0.3~0.5, whereas the ratio for the solar-plus-storage route is as high as 1:1~2, indicating a significant difference in capital expenditure for the storage component. Calculations show that the levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) for wind-plus-storage is 0.03~0.05 RMB/kWh lower than for solar-plus-storage, representing a cost advantage of 5%~15%. Leveraging this significant economic advantage, wind power has become the mainstream choice for green fuel projects and green power supply for data centers. Driven by both green fuel and Sino-European computing-power coordination, it is projected that nearly 465 GW of new wind turbine demand will be generated by 2030. Risk factors include slower-than-expected progress in China's energy independence strategy; lower-than-expected investment in China's AI competition; and slower-than-expected opening of the European wind power market.

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