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The UK’s National Oceanography Centre (NOC) has delivered a roadmap to improve ocean observation and enhance understanding of the potential impacts of expanding offshore wind developments on the marine environment.
The Scoping an Offshore Wind Sustained Observation Programme report was commissioned by the Scottish Government’s Scottish Marine Energy Research (ScotMER) programme, to help inform the planning of offshore wind farm expansion within, but not limited to, the Scottish sector of the North Sea.
The report reviews current knowledge of key environmental aspects of the North Sea, focusing on the water column structure and seasonal variability. It highlights knowledge gaps around potential offshore wind-related impacts and recommends essential ocean variables (EOVs) to be used as a baseline and for future monitoring, said NOC.
“This step in understanding is what we need to baseline and then observe ongoing changes in the marine environment, which will then help to safeguard the health of our ocean,” stated Charlotte Williams , a physical oceanographer at NOC.
The Scottish government aims to add at least 20 GW of new capacity by 2030, potentially meeting about 50 per cent of the country’s current total energy demand.
Scotland currently has 3 GW of operational offshore wind, with the ScotWind leasing round targeting 28 GW across 20 projects and an additional 5 GW through the INTOG round.
Half of these future projects are floating offshore wind developments, which will be placed in slightly deeper waters, which in winter are mixed and in summer are stratified, or divided into different vertical layers that don’t easily mix.
Stratification and mixing are critical to how much phytoplankton there is, said NOC. Phytoplankton form the basis of the marine food web, delivering nutrients to where they are needed and underpinning the ongoing environmental functioning of the sea.
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The report recommends better access to and integration of existing data, prioritising the acquisition of EOVs at regional and site-specific scales. It also suggests that observational parameters, such as those related to column stability and stratification, should be acquired using a range of monitoring platforms, including remote systems.
According to the report, computer model simulations are key as a primary tool to predict the potential cumulative impacts of future infrastructure. The report outlines that models should first be built and validated using existing data and new data acquired during observational campaigns near operational wind farms.
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