ABSTRACT
To understand the worldwide success of Danish wind turbines over the last decades, it is essential to look back at the last 150 years of wind power history in Denmark. With more than 7 000 km of coastlines that are located close to the North Sea, Denmark has extraordinary wind resources. But until the middle of the 19th century, the level of wind energy use in Denmark was very similar to other European countries like Germany, the Netherlands, France and Great Britain. The establishment of new windmills had during centuries been strongly regulated by the crown, but from 1852 to 1862 these restrictions were gradually removed. One result was a growth in the total number of big, commercial grain-grinding windmills from about 800 to more than 2 000 during the rest of the 19th century.
