Abstract
Assessing the environmental impacts of a project are often an important requirement of the planning and consenting process for a marine energy device deployment. Computer simulations are frequently used in other areas of marine energy development, and Individual Based Models (IBMs) provide one method for simulating marine life in order to investigate potential impacts of marine energy devices on the local ecosystem, including the possibility to simulate protected species such as Harbour Porpoise.
This contribution will showcase initial results of a Harbour Porpoise IBM under development at Swansea University, which aims to combine fine scale temporal motion with tidal data from existing hydrodynamic models and other environmental properties in order to examine potential responses of Harbour Porpoise to marine energy developments.