A new research programme has been launched to address the critical gap in understanding how marine ecosystems will respond to the continued growth of offshore wind farms.
The £7 million programme, known as ECOWind, is a joint initiative led by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) in partnership with The Crown Estate. The four-year programme will fund research into how offshore windfarms affect the marine environment, alongside other growing pressures on UK ecosystems. This includes climate change and human activities such as fishing. In particular, the programme will focus on how populations and inter-species interactions are responding to offshore wind deployment and how marine observations can be enhanced through innovative technologies to improve our understanding.
