NOAA Fisheries and the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) announced in a press release a joint strategy “to address potential impacts of offshore wind energy development on NOAA Fisheries’ scientific surveys.” The 37-page “Federal Survey Mitigation Strategy” underscored “the agencies’ shared commitment to the Biden-Harris administration’s clean energy goals of responsibly advancing offshore wind energy production while protecting biodiversity and promoting ocean co-use.” The White House has a goal of increasing the nation’s offshore wind energy capacity to 30 gigawatts by 2030, and an additional 15 gigawatts of floating offshore wind technology by 2035, according to the release.
According to the release, NOAA Fisheries’ scientists have collected survey data for 150 years that “form the basis of the science-based management of America’s federal fisheries,” including the protection of marine wildlife and increasing understanding and care for coastal and marine habitats and ecosystems.
NOAA Fisheries and BOEM “identified major adverse impacts on surveys conducted in the Northeast region” during the environmental review of the “first offshore wind energy project on the U.S. outer continental shelf,” according to the release. This led to the finalized strategy, which identifies ways to mitigate the impacts of offshore wind energy development on the surveys.
The release lists five goals of the strategy:
- Mitigate impacts of offshore wind energy development on NOAA Fisheries surveys.
- Evaluate and integrate, where feasible, wind energy development monitoring studies with NOAA Fisheries surveys.
- Collaboratively plan and implement NOAA Fisheries survey mitigation with partners, stakeholders, and other ocean users, using the principles of best scientific information available and co-production of knowledge, including fishermen’s local ecological knowledge and indigenous traditional ecological knowledge.
- Adaptively implement this strategy, recognizing the long-term nature of the surveys and the dynamic nature of wind energy development, survey technology and approaches, marine ecosystems, and human uses of marine ecosystems.
- Advance coordination between NOAA Fisheries and BOEM in the execution of this strategy, and share experiences and lessons learned with other regions and countries where offshore wind energy development is being planned and underway.
The strategy is focused on New England and the Mid-Atlantic, but will “serve as a model to address the impacts of offshore wind on NOAA Fisheries surveys in other regions.”