Modeling At-Sea Density of Marine Birds to Support Atlantic Marine Renewable Energy Planning : Final Report

Marine birds have the potential to be affected by human activities in the ocean environment such as offshore wind energy development. This report describes a project that developed maps of the spatial distributions of marine bird species in U.S. Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) waters that can be used to aid ocean planning in the region and guide future data collection efforts. Sighting survey data from over three decades contained in the ‘Northwest Atlantic Seabird Catalog’ database, along with Eastern Canada Seabirds at Sea data from Canadian Wildlife Service, Environment and Climate Change Canada, were analyzed to derive seasonal maps of the spatial distributions of 47 marine bird species in U.S. Atlantic OCS and adjacent waters from Florida to Maine. NCCOS IAA MOA-2013-046-8696, BOEM OCS Study 2018-010 NCCOS BOEM IAA M13PG00005