ECOFlow EQUIFy

Establishing a Framework for Quantifiable Evidence and Impact of Ecosystem Change Throughout the Lifecycle of UK Floating Offshore Wind Farms

In response to concerns over climate change and energy security, there are ambitious targets for the expansion of offshore renewable energy. This expansion includes the development of floating offshore windfarms (FLOW) in deeper water environments, and currently there is limited evidence on how the marine environment may be affected. 

The pioneering project named EQUIFy is addressing the challenges set by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and The Crown Estate research programme ‘Ecological Effects of Floating Offshore Wind (ECOFlow)‘. This programme is focused on delivering the critical evidence needs of government and industry required to inform policy and decision making on planned large-scale expansion of FLOW. 

The ‘Establishing a Framework for Quantifiable Evidence and Impact of Ecosystem Change Throughout the Lifecycle of UK Floating Offshore Wind Farms (EQUIFy)’ project, aims to establish a framework for quantifiable evidence and impacts of ecosystem change throughout the lifecycle of UK floating offshore wind farms. 

EQUIFy will use an array of modelling approaches, autonomous monitoring systems and decision support tools to provide a transferable evidence framework that improves current understanding of the likely future effects of FLOW, through field campaigns in the North Sea and with a focus on planned developments in the Celtic Sea. It will deliver new tools and knowledge over a range of scales, from individual turbines to the whole of the UK shelf seas and beyond, and importantly, will provide this understanding within the context of a changing climate and under the changing use of our seas that upscaling FLOW will undoubtedly drive. This will help deliver the tools required to aid quicker and more effective decision-making to accelerate the consenting process. 

For more details please contact: 

Benjamin Williamson (ERI) https://pure.uhi.ac.uk/en/persons/benjamin-williamson