Abstract
This assessment evaluates the impacts of the Project to determine whether it may adversely affect designated Essential Fish Habitat (EFH) for federally managed fisheries from the proposed construction, operation, and decommissioning of a commercial wind energy facility on the outer continental shelf (OCS) offshore of New York, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts.
The Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, as amended by the Sustainable Fisheries Act of 2007 (16 United States Code 1801-1884), requires federal agencies to consult with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Marine Fisheries Service (NOAA Fisheries) on activities that may adversely affect EFH. EFH is defined as “those waters and substrate necessary to fish for spawning, breeding, feeding, or growth to maturity” (National Marine Fisheries Service [NMFS] 1999; NOAA 2018a). NOAA Fisheries further clarified the terms associated with EFH (50 Code of Federal Regulations [CFR] 600.05-600.930 and 600.910) by the following definitions:
- Waters – Aquatic areas and their associated physical, chemical, and biological properties that are used by fish and, where appropriate, may include aquatic areas historically used by fish;
- Substrate – Sediments, hard bottoms, structures underlying the waters, and associated biological communities;
- Necessary – The habitat required to support a sustainable fishery and the managed species’ contribution to a healthy ecosystem;
- Spawning, breeding, feeding, or growth to maturity – Stages representing a species’ full life cycle; and
- Adverse effects – may include direct or indirect physical, chemical, or biological alterations of the waters or substrate as well as the loss of and/or injury to benthic organisms, prey species, their habitat, and other ecosystem components. Adverse effects may be site-specific or habitat-wide impacts including individual, cumulative, or synergistic consequences of actions.
Deepwater Wind South Fork, LLC (DWSF) has submitted the draft Construction and Operations Plan (COP) for the South Fork Wind Farm (SFWF) and South Fork Export Cable (SFEC) to Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) for review and approval. Consistent with the requirements of 30 CFR 585.620 to 585.638, COP submittal occurs after BOEM grants a lease for the Project and DWSF completes all studies and surveys defined in their site assessment plan. BOEM’s renewable energy development process is described in the following section. DWSF is working with BOEM to address additional information needs to finalize the COP. This EFH assessment relies on the most current information available for the Project.
The SFWF includes up to 15 wind turbine generators (WTGs or turbines) with a nameplate capacity of 6 to 12 megawatts (MW) per turbine, an offshore substation (OSS), and a submarine transmission cable network connecting the WTGs (inter-array cables) to the OSS, all of which will be located in BOEM Renewable Energy Lease Area OCS-A 0517 (Lease Area), part of the Rhode Island/Massachusetts Wind Energy Area (RI/MA WEA). The Lease Area is in federal waters of the OCS approximately 19 linear miles (30.6 kilometers [km], 16.5 nautical miles [nm]) southeast of Block Island, Rhode Island, and 35 linear miles (56.3 km, 30.4 nm) east of Montauk Point, New York. The SFWF also includes an Operations and Maintenance (O&M) facility that will be located onshore at a commercial port facility at Lake Montauk in East Hampton, New York.
The SFEC is an alternating current (AC) electric cable that will connect the SFWF to the mainland electric grid on Long Island. The connection point would be located in either East Hampton or Hither Hills, New York. The SFEC includes both offshore and onshore segments. The SFEC includes an offshore component located in federal waters (SFEC – OCS) and a component located in New York State territorial waters (SFEC – NYS). The cable will be buried to a target depth of 4 to 6 feet (1.2 to 1.8 meters) below the seabed over its entire length, except where limited by local substrate conditions.
The onshore underground segment of the export cable (SFEC – Onshore) will be located in East Hampton, New York. The SFEC – NYS will be connected to the SFEC – Onshore via a sea-to-shore transition where the offshore and onshore cables will be spliced together. The SFEC includes a new Interconnection Facility to link the SFEC to the Long Island Power Authority electric transmission and distribution system. The Interconnection Facility will be located in the town of East Hampton, New York. The onshore segments of the SFEC would have no effect on designated EFH and are not considered further in this assessment.
1.1 Project Area
The project area comprises the project footprint for the SFEC, SFWF, and O&M facility and all areas affected by the construction and operation of these facilities, which includes coastal nearshore habitats on eastern Long Island and adjacent New York State waters, the protected coastal bay of Lake Montauk, and ocean habitats in the RI/MA WEA on the OCS offshore of New York, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts. The SFWF and SFEC project areas are shown in Figure 1.1.
The project area is encompassed entirely by 15 10-minute by 10-minute quadrangles as presented in Figure 1.2. These quadrangles are used by the New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) and Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council (MAFMC) to delineate specific areas for the purpose of EFH designation. The selected quadrangles usefully bound the reasonably foreseeable effects on EFH resulting from the construction and operation of the SFWF, SFEC, and O&M facility. This includes short-term impacts on habitat suitability from impact mechanisms like construction noise and suspended sediments, long-term impacts from the presence of the structures, operational noise, and electromagnetic field effects, and potentially permanent impacts. These impacts are detailed in Section 4.
For ease of reference, the quadrangles in Figure 1.2 are assigned reference numbers from 1 to 15 and are used to identify designated those species and life stages having designated EFH in the project area (see Section 5.1). Boundary coordinates for these EFH quadrangles are described in Table 1.1.