Wind–solar generation and scarcity resilience are spatially decoupled in Europe
Abstract
The rapid expansion of wind and solar power is increasing the exposure of European electricity systems to weather-driven variability. Renewable resource assessments commonly emphasise locations with high mean resource availability, implicitly assuming that high mean generation also implies high generation during scarcity conditions. Here we show that this assumption does not hold for continent-wide wind–solar scarcity. Using daily wind and solar capacity factors for 128,931 existing European onshore wind turbine locations during 1986–2025, we identify coherent generation regimes and quantify their performance during low-generation periods. We find a clear spatial decoupling between mean generation and scarcity resilience efficiency: clusters with the highest mean generation are not necessarily those that maintain generation during scarcity, while several clusters with moderate mean generation exhibit comparatively high resilience. These results demonstrate that mean generation and scarcity resilience represent distinct spatial characteristics and provide a resource-side climatological diagnostic for assessing European wind–solar generation under continent-wide scarcity conditions.
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BibTeX
@article{schindler2026windsolar,
title = {{Wind–solar generation and scarcity resilience are spatially decoupled in Europe}},
author = {Dirk Schindler and Christopher Jung},
journal = {Communications Earth \& Environment},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.1038/s43247-026-04191-7},
url = {https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-026-04191-7},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Wind–solar generation and scarcity resilience are spatially decoupled in Europe
AU - Dirk Schindler
AU - Christopher Jung
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/28
JO - Communications Earth & Environment
DO - 10.1038/s43247-026-04191-7
UR - https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-026-04191-7
AB - The rapid expansion of wind and solar power is increasing the exposure of European electricity systems to weather-driven variability. Renewable resource assessments commonly emphasise locations with high mean resource availability, implicitly assuming that high mean generation also implies high generation during scarcity conditions. Here we show that this assumption does not hold for continent-wide wind–solar scarcity. Using daily wind and solar capacity factors for 128,931 existing European onshore wind turbine locations during 1986–2025, we identify coherent generation regimes and quantify their performance during low-generation periods. We find a clear spatial decoupling between mean generation and scarcity resilience efficiency: clusters with the highest mean generation are not necessarily those that maintain generation during scarcity, while several clusters with moderate mean generation exhibit comparatively high resilience. These results demonstrate that mean generation and scarcity resilience represent distinct spatial characteristics and provide a resource-side climatological diagnostic for assessing European wind–solar generation under continent-wide scarcity conditions.
SN - 2662-4435
ER -