New York State
Environmental Technical Working Group
2020 State of the Science Workshop
Work Groups
State of the Science Workshop on Wildlife and Offshore Wind Energy 2020: Cumulative Impacts
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Workshop attendees, under the guidance of technical leads, have formed work groups to identify scientific research, monitoring, and coordination needs to improve our understanding of cumulative impacts. The goal for each work group will be to identify a list of studies that could be implemented in the next 5 years to position the stakeholder community to better understand cumulative impacts as the offshore wind industry develops in the U.S. There are seven taxonomically-focused work groups: benthos, fishes and mobile invertebrates, birds, bats, marine mammals, sea turtles, and environmental change. Work groups have been meeting throughout the winter to develop research priorities. The final webinar for this effort, on May 21, will brings together the leads from the seven work groups to present their recommendations and discuss common themes among groups.
State of the Science Culmination Webinar
Friday, May 21 at 12-2 pm EDT
This webinar is free and open to all workshop attendees and work group participants, but we are asking that you please register in advance.
Many thanks to all work group members! Collectively, these work groups represent over 200 scientific experts and other stakeholders, and we've been having very informative, productive Zoom meetings over the last few months. A big thank you is due, in particular, to our work group leads, who are putting a great deal of time into planning meetings, developing draft reports, and other efforts. Thank you all for your recent (and ongoing) efforts!
Working Group Descriptions
Benthos
Technical Leads: Steven Degraer, Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences & Zoe Hutchison, University of St. Andrews
Logistical Lead: Carl Lobue, The Nature Conservancy
This group will build off existing work in Europe, such as the Dutch Governmental Offshore Wind Ecological Programme (WOZEP) [1], to identify research questions to improve our understanding of cumulative biological impacts to benthos from offshore wind development. Group discussion will focus on how best to understand the potential long-term effects of offshore wind development on benthic communities, including changes in substrate availability, community composition, and ecosystem structure and function.
Fishes and mobile invertebrates
Technical Lead: Arthur Popper, University of Maryland
Logistical Lead: Lyndie Hice-Dunton, Responsible Offshore Science Alliance
This group will build on existing research priorities to improve our understanding of the cumulative impacts of offshore wind development on fishes and invertebrates in the water column. Group discussion will focus on the effects of aquatic noise (both sound pressure and particle motion).
Birds
Technical Lead: Aonghais Cook, British Trust for Ornithology
Logistical Lead: Jillian Liner, Audubon New York
This group will build off existing research in Europe, as well as recent efforts in the eastern U.S. to develop a scientific research framework to understand the effects of offshore wind development on birds and bats [2]. Discussion will focus on how best to improve our understanding of cumulative impacts from offshore wind to birds in relation to displacement and barrier effects, collision mortality, and habitat change. This will include consideration of known and suspected taxon-specific differences in vulnerability to these stressors.
Bats
Technical Lead: Cris Hein, National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Logistical Lead: Louis Brzuzy, Shell New Energies
This group will build off existing research such as the Dutch Governmental Offshore Wind Ecological Programme (WOZEP)[1], as well as recent efforts in the eastern U.S. to develop a scientific research framework to understand the effects of offshore wind development on birds and bats. Group discussions will focus on how best to improve our understanding of the potential for cumulative impacts to bats from offshore wind development, including addressing gaps in our knowledge of bat abundance, distribution, and behavior in the offshore environment, and the potential for collision-related impacts.
Marine mammals
Technical Lead: Brandon Southall, Southall Environmental Associates, Inc
Logistical Lead: Laura Morse, Ørsted
This group will use the recent development of a scientific research framework to understand the impacts of offshore wind development in the northeastern U.S. on protected species [3], which identifies hypotheses relating to short- and long-term effects of wind energy development at the project level. Group discussion will focus on how best to improve our understanding of potential cumulative impacts to marine mammals in relation to aquatic noise, collision risk, and other factors, including identifying specific studies to test identified hypotheses.
Sea turtles
Technical Lead: Gregg Gitschlag, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Logistical Lead: Ruth Perry, Shell New Energies
This group may use information on impacts to sea turtles from other industries, such as offshore oil and gas, as well as the recent development of a scientific research framework to understand the impacts to protected species from offshore wind development in the northeastern U.S. [3]. Group discussion will focus on how best to improve our understanding of the potential cumulative impacts to sea turtles from offshore wind development in relation to underwater sound, vessel interactions, EMF, or other factors.
Environmental Change
Technical Lead: Jeff Carpenter, Helmholtz-Zentrum Geesthacht
Building off existing work by MARACOOS [4] and others, this group will focus on how best to improve our understanding of the cumulative effects of offshore wind on oceanographic conditions and habitats. Discussion topics could include the potential for offshore wind development to influence cold pool mixing, local wind patterns, wave generation, tidal amplitudes, stratification of the water column, and dynamics of suspended particles and bedload transport of sediment.
References
[1] Dutch Governmental Offshore Wind Ecological Programme. 2016. Offshore wind energy ecological programme (WOZEP): Monitoring
and research programme 2017-2021. Rijkswaterstaat. 69 pp. Available here
[2] Bird and Bat Scientific Research Framework effort supported by NYSERDA. Learn more
[3] Kraus, S.D., R.D. Kenney, and L. Thomas. 2019. A framework for studying the effects of offshore wind development on marine mammals
and sea turtles. Report prepared for the Massachusetts Clean Energy center, Boston, MA and the Bureau of Ocean Energy
Management. 48 pp. Available here
[4] Mid-Atlantic Regional Association Coastal Observing System. Learn more
Photo credits: Loggerhead sea turtle © Kate Sutherland; Benthos © Yannis Papanastasopoulos; Fish © Lance Anderson; Northern gannet © Benoit Gauzere; Bats © Clament Falize; Humpback whale © Richard Sagredo; Green sea turtle © James Thorton; Ocean © Ines Alvarez