Artificial Reefs and Benthic Changes in Relation to MRE

Webinar #12 in Annex IV Environmental Webinar Series
Sponsored by Ocean Energy Systems (OES)
April 25, 2017 @ 15:00 - 16:30 UTC

Summary
This webinar will look at the environmental effects of marine renewable energy (MRE) devices related to benthic habitat and community changes, and the effects of artificial reefs, specifically focusing on marine fish and crustaceans.

The presentation is available here.

Presenters

Sharon Kramer, PhD, H. T. Harvey & Associates
MRE devices are only beginning to be deployed along the U.S. West Coast and in Hawai’i, and a better understanding of their ecological effects on fish, particularly on special-status fish is needed to facilitate project design and environmental permitting. The structures of MRE devices placed on to the seabed, such as anchors and foundations, may function as artificial reefs that attract reef-associated fishes, while the midwater and surface structures, such as mooring lines, buoys, and wave or tidal energy devices, may function as fish aggregating devices (FADs). This webinar will look at the potential for these ecological interactions to occur at MRE devices by evaluating and comparing interactions at surrogate structures, such as artificial reefs, natural reefs, kelp vegetation, floating and sunken debris, oil and gas platforms, anchored FADs deployed to enhance fishing opportunities, net-cages used for mariculture, and piers and marinas.

Dr. Sharon Kramer is a principal, and heads H. T. Harvey & Associate's North Coast office and the Fish Ecology team. She has more than 30 years of experience in aquatic ecology and fisheries biology in the Pacific Northwest, California, Australia, and Hawai‘i. Sharon is well-versed in fish and aquatic habitat restoration and monitoring, and project permitting, with extensive federal Endangered Species Act work. Her most recent focus has involved permitting, assessing and mitigating the environmental effects associated with marine renewable energy projects.

Olivia Langhamer, PhD, Research Fellow at the Department of Energy and Environment, Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden
Dr. Olivia Langhamer will discuss the effects of offshore wind and wave power devices on adjacent motile benthic organisms, such as fish and crustaceans. She has been conducting environmental monitoring and effect studies related to MRE in Sweden since 2004 by scuba diving and fyke net fishing. Dr. Langhamer will present her results on the effects of introduced hard substrate in terms of wave and wind power foundations on recruitment and populations dynamics of fish and crustaceans.

Dr. Langhamer grew up in southern Germany and received her pre-diploma in Biology at the Ruprecht- Karls University of Heidelberg.  She continued her studies in Sweden with focus on the aquatic world and received her MSc in Marine Zoology at Gothenburg University. She followed her research interests resulting in a PhD in Animal Ecology at Uppsala University in 2009 working on the environmental effects of wave power devices. Olivia's postdoctoral work at the Centre for Biodiversity Dynamics, Department Of Biology at NTNU centered on populations of fish and crabs, and their response to offshore wind. She recently joined the Department of Energy and Environment at Chalmers University of Technology as Research Fellow and will be working in collaboration with Uppsala University and Queens University Belfast on investigating and mitigating environmental impacts of hydrokinetic turbines.

A video recording of the webinar is posted below: