Spatial planning of offshore wind farms: A windfall to marine environmental protection?

Punt, Maarten; Groeneveld, R.A.; Ierland, E.C. van; Stel, Jan H.

doi:10.1016/j.ecolecon.2009.07.013

Cited by 100 publications

(55 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol20/iss1/art64/ Biological diversity, D1, may be affected both positively and negatively at different sites and during the several phases of the OWF life cycle. There is the potential for habitat loss and disturbance leading to a reduction in biodiversity during construction (Petersen and Malm 2006); changes in sedimentation, particularly from piling activities during construction, may also lead to effects such as the smothering of some species (Airoldi 2003); there may be an increase in biodiversity with pylons acting as artificial reefs or encouraging fish aggregation during operation (Punt et al 2009), but the area may also be avoided by some seabird species (Busch et al 2013); the behavioral responses of higher predators such as marine mammals during the operational phase is largely unknown but likely to be quite complex. The effects of decommissioning are currently unknown.…”

Section: Offshore Wind Farmsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Marine spatial planning and Good Environmental Status: a perspective on spatial and temporal dimensions

Gilbert¹,

Alexander²,

Sardá³

et al. 2015

E&S

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ABSTRACT. The European Union Marine Strategy Framework Directive requires the Good Environmental Status of marine environments in Europe's regional seas; yet, maritime activities, including sources of marine degradation, are diversifying and intensifying in an increasingly globalized world. Marine spatial planning is emerging as a tool for rationalizing competing uses of the marine environment while guarding its quality. A directive guiding the development of such plans by European Union member states is currently being formulated. There is an undeniable need for marine spatial planning. However, we argue that considerable care must be taken with marine spatial planning, as the spatial and temporal scales of maritime activities and of Good Environmental Status may be mismatched. We identify four principles for careful and explicit consideration to align the requirements of the two directives and enable marine spatial planning to support the achievement of Good Environmental Status in Europe's regional seas.Key Words: DPSWR; Good Environmental Status; marine spatial planning; maritime spatial planning; spatial scale temporal scale THE POLICY CONTEXT Global and regional assessments confirm that the capacity of our ocean ecosystems to continue to deliver ecosystem services that underpin human well-being is declining because of human activities (e. The EU is drafting a directive on MSP specifically to give cross-border cooperation a firm legal footing (European Commission 2013). Although the responsibility for MSP lies at the national level and addresses maritime activities in a nation's Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), a transnational, subregional, and even a regional sea perspective is called for when maritime activities and/or their effects cross national borders (Gee et al. 2011). This creates considerable challenges for the planning process and stakeholder consultation (e.g., Argardy et al. 2011, Maritime Spatial Planning in the North Sea 2012, Halpern et al. 2012, Jentoft and Knol 2014. However, it also provides challenges for assessing effects on the marine environment given the requirement under the MSFD to achieve GES at subregional and 9]). We address effects on the marine environment by examining the spatial and temporal dimensions of both GES and MSP.We examine the role of MSP in an ecosystem approach and MSP's potential contributions to achieving GES. We aim to assess whether mismatches of spatial and temporal scales between MSP and marine ecosystems might constrain this role and these contributions. The methodology is based on the Driver Pressure State Welfare Response (DPSWR) framework (Cooper 2013). Findings are illustrated by two case studies representing aspects of traditional and emerging sea use. We use DPSWR to provide a context for MSP in an ecosystem approach to achieve GES. We then compare the spatial and temporal scales of MSP and GES. We identify a number of principles that require explicit consideration by MSP. These principles address the specific focus of our work; namely, the spatial an...

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Section: Offshore Wind Farmsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Marine spatial planning and Good Environmental Status: a perspective on spatial and temporal dimensions

Gilbert¹,

Alexander²,

Sardá³

et al. 2015

E&S

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“…primarily caused by solid manmade structures founded on the seafloor [2,11]. Offshore wind park turbines are functioning as artificial reefs, affecting local ecosystem [12].…”

Section: Environmental Impact To the Marine Ecosystemmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This is important resource, exploitation of which is increasing fast because of the general concern about global warming and limited oil resources in the world [1]. It is proved to be a reliable, natural and renewable source of electrical power supply [1,2]. This technology has potential to significantly reduce the emission of carbon dioxide and the use of fossil fuels and their negative impact on the environment.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This technology has potential to significantly reduce the emission of carbon dioxide and the use of fossil fuels and their negative impact on the environment. Emission of carbon dioxide takes place only during the construction, maintenance and decommissioning phases of operation of offshore wind parks while energy generation, at the operation phase, is carbon dioxide neutral [2].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Environmental concerns related to the construction of offshore wind parks: Baltic Sea case

Rostin¹,

Martin²,

Herkül³

2013

WIT Transactions on Ecology and the Environment

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Wind energy is considered to be one of the most promising sources of renewable energy in the future. Planning and construction of offshore wind parks is very active in the Northern Europe and Baltic Sea area. Currently, numbers of largescale projects are under development in the Baltic Sea area and, in most cases, the information on proper environmental impact assessment (EIA) of this activity is missing. There are a number of environmental concerns that are well documented from terrestrial environment (e.g. effects on bird migration) but the marine environment creates some additional possible impacts and threats. Some of them are already well studied, but many aspects remain unclear. The Baltic Sea, being a unique ecosystem, is considered to be vulnerable to many pressures which can be caused by large construction activities. These harmful effects can be destruction and modification of habitat characteristics during the construction phase, noise pollution during construction and low frequency vibration during operation, modification of migration routes, formation of artificial substrate and favourable conditions for alien species invasion etc. Besides harmful impacts, also some positive effects on local biodiversity are usually mentioned, such as the so-called "reef effect".In the current paper we analyse existing information on the known effects of the construction of offshore wind parks in the Baltic Sea area and illustrate the negative and positive effects of the construction activities on local biodiversity based on a study performed in the framework of EIA of offshore wind park development project in the north-eastern Baltic Sea (Neugrund bank, Gulf of Finland). Results are generalized for the whole Baltic Sea area and recommendations are drawn for EIA studies of future development projects.

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“…MRE installations will result in more utilization of the marine environment, which increases the possibility of affecting ocean ecosystems in additional ways. In order to minimize impacts from a new ocean use, researchers have emphasized the need to identify and diminish adverse social and ecological consequences of the planning, installation, and operation of MRE devices (Inger et al 2009, Punt et al 2009, Conway et al 2010, Henkel et al 2013). Many ecological concerns of MRE installations focus on the direct interaction of marine organisms with the devices and mooring lines (Boehlert & Gill 2010, Henkel et al 2013 as well as disturbance from underwater noise or electromagnetic fields created by the generation of electricity (Gill 2005, Wilson et al 2010.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Benthic effects of artificial structures deployed in a tidal estuary

Mendoza

Henkel

2017

Plankton Benthos Res

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There has been increased enthusiasm to mitigate the negative effects of fossil fuel consumption through the use of cleaner sources of energy, like marine renewable energy (MRE). Concerns about MRE deployments have motivated research on the ecological effects of these new man-made structures in marine environments. We assessed the extent to which soft-sediment habitats are influenced by the presence of artificial structures deployed in Yaquina Bay, Oregon, USA. Grain size analyses confirmed artificial structures altered the sediment distribution around them with larger grain sizes detected closer to the structures. Infaunal abundances were higher closer to the artificial structures; however, these differences did not result in statistically significant effects on diversity or richness in relation to distance from the structures, nor were they sufficient to cause statistically significant changes in infaunal communities as compared to reference areas. This study provided additional evidence that artificial structures alter their physical environment, but in our study detected differences were less than those observed between the two different regions of the estuary and any effects on infauna were localized and smaller than differences between different regions of the estuary. Conducting these studies in an Oregon estuary provided a good proxy for estimating potential effects of in-stream tidal energy deployments in the Pacific Northwest while also demonstrating the importance of site-specific research.

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Spatial planning of offshore wind farms: A windfall to marine environmental protection?

Cited by 100 publications

References 38 publications

Marine spatial planning and Good Environmental Status: a perspective on spatial and temporal dimensions

Marine spatial planning and Good Environmental Status: a perspective on spatial and temporal dimensions

Environmental concerns related to the construction of offshore wind parks: Baltic Sea case

Benthic effects of artificial structures deployed in a tidal estuary

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