Annual Impact Meetings

In November 2024 offshore wind stakeholders, developers, policy experts and researchers came together at the ECOWind/OWEC Annual Impact Meeting (AIM) in Southampton to discuss latest findings of the research. A summary of the meeting is available here: AIM Summary Report 2024.

The event aimed to translate cutting-edge research from ECOWind and ECOFlow into actionable solutions and identify opportunities for real-world applications. The latest science from ECOWind was presented across four themes in relation to offshore wind including: benthic ecosystem dynamics, impacts on prey, innovative methods and cumulative and climate change effects. Key stakeholders across government, advisors, industry, and consultants presented on the latest updates in strategic evidence, offshore wind planning, strategic compensation and marine net gain.

You can find video recordings of this Annual Impact Meeting in a dedicated YouTube playlist here

You can find the slides below:

• Keynote & Session 1: Benthic ecosystems and interactions with OWF
• Session 2: Impacts of offshore wind on prey distribution, availability and foraging opportunities
• Session 3: Innovative data collection approaches
• Session 4: The cumulative effects of OWFs and environmental drivers of climate change
• Session 5: ECOFlow
• Policy session: Strategic evidence, compensation and MNG

You can find the AIM Posters below:

Physical processes

• How the turbulent wake of OWF monopiles can change seabed properties via excess bed shear stress
• Enhanced bed shear stress and mixing in the tidal wake of an OWF monopile
• The impact of OWF on ocean stratification
• Investigating the future bio-physical impacts of OWF
• The effects of OWF at a regional scale

Seabirds & pred-prey relationships

• The effects of OWF developments on seabird-prey patch dynamics
• The link from physical environment to diving seabird distribution
• Effectiveness of compensatory measures for UK seabirds

Benthic ecosystems

• Development of an Eastern Irish Sea model to predict changes to seabed habitats
• New approaches to predictive habitat & biodiversity modelling
• Modelling predictions of seabed vulnerability to climate-crises driven changes
• The scale of change for benthic communities
• There’s more to sound than meets the ear

Cumulative effects

• The cumulative ecosystem effects of OWF and climate change – Compensation & MNG

Innovative approaches

• Modelling of EMF produced by HV submarine cables
• Synthetic cable for the assessment of marine power impact
• Tool for evaluating OWF turbine effects on seabed ecosystems
• Combining DNA metabarcoding and stable isotope analysis for diet studies in diving seabird
• Sea-surface monitoring with an AUV
• Multi-platform fieldwork in support of PELAgIO
• A GIS tool to evaluate mussel cultivation in EU waters

In November 2023 offshore wind stakeholders, developers, policy experts and researchers came together at the ECOWind/OWEC Annual Impact Meeting (AIM) in Manchester to discuss how offshore wind affects ecosystems around the UK.

The event was an important opportunity for ECOWind projects to hear directly about the challenges facing policy and industry colleagues, and to reflect on all the progress they’d achieved over the past year. It was a chance for project teams to show off research highlights, and look to the future to identify critical knowledge gaps that the programme can address in the coming years to meet our climate and biodiversity challenges.

You can find video recordings of this Annual Impact Meeting in a dedicated YouTube playlist here.