Offshore Wind Sediment-borne Vibrations

Our team is engaging with academic partners at Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the University of Rhode Island to investigate vibrations on the seafloor surface and in seafloor sediments that are created by various offshore pile installation methods. Offshore pile installation for wind farm development can generate vibrational waves that travel in sediments and propagate along the sea floor surface, possibly impacting benthic animals such as crabs, scallops, and lobsters, and contributing to additional noise in the water column. Our team is working to understand how these waves are generated by different installation methods and to what extent they are impacting various marine ecosystems.

By combining our expertise in acoustic modelling, noise impact assessments, and benthic ecology, we are working to understand the role of surficial sediments in ground vibrations, better define acoustic propagation in sediments with our SPI/PV imagery, and cross-walk our acoustic modelling with benthic habitat maps to assess potential impacts of sediment borne-waves on the seafloor and the organisms that call it home.