Abstract
As the development of large-scale offshore wind farms (OWFs) amplifies due to technological progress and a growing demand for renewable energy, associated footprints on the seabed are becoming increasingly common within soft-bottom environments. A large part of the footprint is the scour protection, often consisting of rocks that are positioned on the seabed to prevent erosion. As such, scour protection may resemble a marine rocky reef and could have important ecosystem functions. While acknowledging that OWFs disrupt the marine environment, the aim of this systematic review was to examine the effects of scour protection on fish assemblages, relate them to the effects of designated artificial reefs (ARs) and, ultimately, reveal how future scour protection may be tailored to support abundance and diversity of marine species. The results revealed frequent increases in abundances of species associated with hard substrata after the establishment of artificial structures (i.e., both OWFs and ARs) in the marine environment. Literature indicated that scour protection meets the requirements to function as an AR, often providing shelter, nursery, reproduction, and/or feeding opportunities. Using knowledge from AR models, this review suggests methodology for ecological improvements of future scour protections, aiming towards a more successful integration into the marine environment.
Highlights
Humans rely upon and utilize the marine environment for a variety of ecosystem services and valuable resources, leaving no parts of the oceans unaffected [1,2]
“Ocean sprawl” refers to a marine environment that is increasingly becoming dominated by artificial structures, including artificial reefs, breakwaters, seawalls, piers, oil platforms, and marine renewable energy installations [7], often causing various effects on the surrounding ecosystems [8]
The review synthesized the effects of artificial reefs (ARs) and scour protection on fish biota and suggested approaches for enhancing the ecological function of scour protection
Summary
Humans rely upon and utilize the marine environment for a variety of ecosystem services and valuable resources, leaving no parts of the oceans unaffected [1,2]. “Ocean sprawl” refers to a marine environment that is increasingly becoming dominated by artificial structures, including artificial reefs, breakwaters, seawalls, piers, oil platforms, and marine renewable energy installations [7], often causing various effects on the surrounding ecosystems [8]. Specific AR purposes may include aquaculture/sea-ranching, biomass increase, biodiversity enrichment, fisheries production, ecosystem management, prevention of coastal erosion, recreational activities (e.g., scuba diving, ecotourism, fishing), and research [10,12,13]. These engineered structures are typically constructed to resemble natural reefs as much as possible, with the ultimate goal to produce similar effects. There are other structures acting as ARs that (a) have entered the marine environment accidentally (e.g., shipwrecks, lost containers), (b) have been repurposed (e.g., sunken ships for recreational activities) or (c) serve other functions (e.g., offshore oil and gas platforms) [14,15,16,17]
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