Malta has huge potential to generate power from wind, even though it remains far from reaching its renewable energy targets by 2020, according to a European Environmental Agency study.

The technical study, which measured Europe's wind power generation potential, showed Malta could produce some seven billion kilowatt hours (kWh) of commercial viable electricity by 2030. This exceeds the electricity required by the island, seeing that, in 2005, its demand stood at 1.9 billion kWh.

An EU official said the study only showed how much land and offshore areas each country could afford to dedicate to installing two-megawatt wind turbines.

"Obviously, we are not saying Malta should use all its available space to produce wind energy but the study shows it has a lot of potential areas, which can be used for commercially viable wind energy production," he said.

The study, besides being based on other indicators such as sea depth and wind direction and force, also took into consideration the cost entailed in building and running the infrastructure.

Malta's seven billion kWh potential was described as "competitive", meaning the average production cost would be lower than 5c5 for every kilowatt hour of wind energy produced.

In offshore farms, costs would increase according to the wind farm's distance from the shore and the depth of the seabed. The study only considered offshore wind farms built in depths of less than 50 metres, as the technology available for deeper waters is still under developed and not commercially feasible.

Malta is evaluating the possibility of building three wind farms - two onshore, in Ħal Far and Wied Rini, and one offshore on a reef off the Mellieħa coast, known as Sikka l-Bajda.

No final decision has been taken yet as technical studies are evaluating whether these are viable projects in commercial terms and electricity generation.

Malta is bound by an EU agreement to produce 10 per cent of its energy from renewable sources by 2020.

According to EU statistics, Malta is at the bottom of the league when it comes to renewable energy as it is the only country, together with Cyprus, which is still totally dependent on fuel to fire its power stations.

Sweden is the champion in this area producing 40.8 per cent of its energy needs from renewable sources. It is followed by Romania (19.2 per cent), Denmark (17 per cent) and Portugal (17 per cent).