The South Fork Wind Benthic Monitoring Program released a visual survey earlier this month conducted at South Fork Wind, an offshore wind farm located 16.5 nautical miles southeast of Block Island, Rhode Island in the Cox Ledge area. The survey shows that the project has had minimal environmental impact on the surrounding marine ecosystem and has created a positive “reef effect.” Key findings of the study include no detectable changes to the biological communities on the seafloor surrounding the turbines; marine life is using the wind turbine foundations as habitat; and the project is already creating a reef effect, providing habitat for commercially, recreationally, and ecologically important marine species. Similar “reef effects” have been documented by peer reviewed studies at European wind farms and during a seven-year study at the Block Island Wind Farm, which showed there was a greater amount of Atlantic cod and black sea bass in the wind farm area compared to two control areas outside the wind farm, and all other species abundance was even. More information can be found here. The South Fork Wind Benthic Monitoring Program can be found here.
