Germany is set to overtake the UK to become the world’s leading market for offshore wind installations this year.

That’s according to a new report, which states Germany will add 2,071MW of capacity in 2015 – an almost fourfold increase from the 529MW added last year.

UK installations are expected to remain “relatively steady”, falling marginally from 813MW to 801MW this year.

China is also predicted to beat the UK with 817MW of capacity this year.

Ankit Mathur, Practice Head for Power at GlobalData said: “Germany’s huge increase in offshore installations is attributable to several offshore wind projects scheduled to come online in 2015. China is also planning an array of offshore wind projects this year, which will see it overtake the UK for annual installations.

“Additionally, the next few years will see China maintain its annual offshore wind installations around the 1GW mark while the UK will observe relatively lower installations until 2018, when the country’s next offshore growth spurt is expected.”

Globally, annual offshore wind installations are also expected to more than double, from 1,681MW in 2014 to 3,903MW this year.

However, they are predicted to fall to 3,255MW in 2016.