SWIM - Preparatory survey

The seas and oceans provide resources for a range of industrial and recreational activities, from commercial shipping to recreational boating, and from resource exploration to wind energy. All these rapidly expanding activities generate sounds, often very loud, that travel long distances through water. The growth of the ocean economy means that human-generated noise is becoming dominant in marine soundscapes worldwide. It has been observed that this can be very harmful to marine life, but the extent of the damage has not been quantified. Scientific knowledge of underwater noise pollution is growing rapidly but remains limited; further research is needed to provide policymakers with essential guidelines for the sustainable exploitation of marine resources. Future noise pollution models will need to include precise information on specific noise sources, the propagation of elastic waves in marine environments, and the impact of noise on individual marine species. SWIM helps us understand how new wind farms could affect toothed whales, depending on their characteristics (such as fixed or floating turbines) and their location.

The preparatory survey lasted two days, from 19 to 20 August 2024. During this time, an initial set of recordings was made to identify possible issues and to test the instrumentation to be used in the main measurement campaigns. The best locations for the deployment of the extended period survey planned for later were also defined during this period. During this campaign, several measurements were acquired following a transect strategy, with progressively increasing distance from the turbines and increasing sea bottom depth. This allows modelling of the actual propagation of turbine-related noise and comparison with the measurements.