Importance of Environmental Baseline Survey for Offshore Wind Farms and Methods for Conducting It

Globally, the hydrocarbon industry has enough experience to carry out the offshore metocean, geophysical and geotechnical surveys, and therefore that knowledge has been extended to offshore wind farms as well with suitable modifications owing to their different construction, design, extent, and other characteristics as compared to hydrocarbon drilling arrangement. However, historically, the Environmental Baseline Survey (EBS) has not been given as much importance as other surveys since it doesn’t directly affect the revenues, instead, is sometimes seen as an additional expense. Further, there is a lack of long-term studies of the EBS techniques adopted for offshore wind farms since this renewable source of energy has been exploited at a large scale only over the past few decades. A well-designed EBS helps to strive for: protection of existing ecological environment and development with minimum harm to marine habitat. This paper describes the methodology to conduct the EBS for benthos, littoral habitats, birds, basking sharks, marine mammals, cultural heritage, coastal processes, fisheries, and physical–chemical characteristics of water. Further, the paper also discusses the best practices to conduct EBS worldwide and the applicability of such practices in Indian context. Some important factors to be considered while planning out the EBS are also highlighted.