Masdar as a city is not progressing - only the Post Grad University (MIST) has been built so far. No other permanent buildings. The HQ Building which was promised to IRENA is not yet started. No residential plots are being developed. A large part of the site is now being allocated to education/ university buildings - not in line with the original master plan.

There are many reasons why it is not happening but the bottom lines are cost and that no-one will now buy anything off-plan.

They did consider wind power and rejected it for the very good reasons that the average wind speed in that location is below the starting speed of most types of turbines, you cannot use high towers because of the proximity of the airport and lastly wind generators are noisy. (Abu Dhabi is using wind power on off shore islands where different criteria apply).