Seagreen has submitted Coast Protection Act (CPA) 1949 consent applications to Marine Scotland and to the Marine Management Organisation (MMO) for an Oceanographic Survey in relation to the development of the Firth of Forth Round 3 Offshore Wind Zone.
The survey data will inform wind farm engineering design and will also be used in the assessment of hydrodynamics and sediment processes as part of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) for the proposed wind farm developments within the Zone.
The survey will include deployment of wave meters and current meters at locations throughout the Zone over winter 2010/11.
The objective of the Oceanographic Survey is to capture at least several storm events, with a range of wind, wave and current conditions and directions of approach.
The data set will provide a basis for subsequent comparison and calibration of longer-term hindcast metocean models of the region and extrapolation to probability of excedence levels for use in wind farm engineering design.
The survey results will also be utilised in the Coastal Processes Assessment to be undertaken as part of the Environmental Impact Assessment for the proposed wind farm developments within the Zone.
The survey instrumentation will be deployed for one winter season from November 2010 through to April 2011, with service visits at nominal 1.5 to 2-month intervals (subject to weather) to download and inspect data and service the equipment.
The instrumentation will include surface deployed wave buoys and a combination of bed-mounted Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler (ADCP) current meters and Acoustic Wave and Current meters (AWACs).
The current meters will be recovered after approximately 6 weeks of successful data collection. The wave meters will be deployed for the full survey duration.
The survey will also include measurement of suspended sediments. Water and sediment samples will be collected at the time each instrument is deployed, at service visits and on recovery.