A 100-megawatt maritime wind turbine test site will be built off the west coast by 2012.

The Knowledge Economy Ministry said Sunday that the test site will help develop the maritime wind power generation industry by late 2012. The renewable energy source has big export potential.

Since one wind turbine generates two megawatts of electricity, the envisioned complex will have 50 wind turbines to make it the largest in Korea.

The government will first secure a sufficient amount of wind power generation technology through the test site, after which it will expand it to a one-or two-gigawatt complex and a base for maritime wind power generation.

The global wind power market was worth nearly 52 billion U.S. dollars in 2008, larger than that of memory chips. Maritime wind power generation is more common than wind farms on land and the market is estimated to grow significantly from 2013.