Climate change impact on future Egypt’s wind energy: a CMIP6-based assessment of power output

Egypt possesses substantial potential for renewable energy generation, prompting heavy national investments to increase the share of wind power in its overall energy portfolio. Consequently, it is crucial to evaluate the long-term vulnerability of future wind energy production to climate change. This study fills a critical gap in regional climate-energy modelling by providing a novel quantification of turbine-specific capacity ratios across four Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSP1-2.6, SSP2-4.5, SSP3-7.0 and SSP5-8.5). Through a comparative assessment of 23 CMIP6 Global Climate Models (GCMs), EC-Earth3-Veg, EC-Earth3, and CESM2-WACCM were identified as the most reliable models against historical ERA5-Land data using the Kling-Gupta Efficiency (KGE) metric, followed by Quantile Mapping for bias correction of both historical and future scenarios. Evaluating nine wind turbine models (T1-T9) revealed that T1 and T2 maintained the highest historical capacity ratios, peaking at 68.0-76.5% and 59.5-68.0%, respectively. By 2100, meteorological projections indicate a regional warming trend coupled with a decrease in mean wind speed; notably, the high-emission SSP5-8.5 scenario projects the highest mean temperature (28 °C) and lowest mean wind speed (3.8 m/s). Despite these declines, future projections for T1 and T2 indicate resilient power generation and localized increases in strategic locations, such as Ras Ghareb and southern Egypt, particularly under the SSP2-4.5 scenario. Ultimately, these findings provide essential data-driven insights for energy planners to optimize turbine selection and site development, ensuring the long-term resilience of Egypt's wind energy infrastructure.