One of the major challenges facing the offshore renewable energy industry is how to deliver the speed and extent of the dramatic increase in offshore wind deployment needed to meet the UK’s Net Zero targets.

This report introduces an alternative monitoring approach for the offshore wind industry. There is a need to take advantage of innovative technologies to better understand the functioning of the UK marine ecosystems within which large-scale offshore wind deployment is situated. There needs to be a collaborative effort to enable a transformation in data gathering driven by a regional ecosystem-based monitoring programme (REMP) supported by new technologies that can be confidently incorporated into impact assessments and future monitoring plans. By implementing a regional monitoring programme, a more coherent and cohesive approach across multiple sites can deliver targeted monitoring that enables the cumulative effects to be more accurately assessed.

A proposed framework for how a REMP might operate has been suggested, the role of innovative technology in enabling a monitoring programme at a regional scale and the importance of standardising and streamlining data management and environmental impact assessment (EIA) reporting. All have the potential to streamline the data gathering, analysis and decisionmaking process to accelerate consenting.

Read more in the full report below.