The OES-Environmental 2020 State of the Science Report: Environmental Effects of Marine Renewable Energy Development Around the World builds on and serves as an update and a complement to the 2013 Final Report for Phase 1 of OES-Environmental and the 2016 State of the Science Report. Its content reflects the most current and pertinent published information about interactions of marine renewable energy (MRE) devices and associated infrastructure with the animals and habitats that make up the marine environment. It has been developed and reviewed by over 60 international experts and scientists from around the world as part of an ongoing effort supported by the OES collaboration that operates within the International Technology Cooperation Framework of the International Energy Agency (IEA).
The 2020 State of the Science Report on the environmental effects of MRE development begins with a set of environmental questions that define investigations (Chapter 2) and continues with specific information about stressor/receptor interactions of importance (Chapters 3–9), delves into technologies for monitoring interactions with marine animals (Chapter 10), addresses a series of management and planning measures that may assist with responsible MRE development (Chapters 11–13), and concludes with a potential path forward (Chapter 14).
Some of the chapters in the 2020 State of the Science Report contained more information and technical details than could be accommodated in the main report. These materials appear as supplementary materials, which are linked within the 2020 State of the Science Report itself and available for download here:
- Chapter 4: Risk to Marine Animals from Underwater Noise Generated by Marine Renewable Energy Devices (Supplementary Material)
- Chapter 9: Social and Economic Data Collection for Marine Renewable Energy (Supplementary Material)
- Chapter 10: Environmental Monitoring Technologies and Techniques for Detecting Interactions of Marine Animals with Turbines (Supplementary Material)
- Chapter 11: Marine Spatial Planning and Marine Renewable Energy (Supplementary Material)
- Chapter 12: Adaptive Management Related to Marine Renewable Energy (Supplementary Material)