Hiring Institution
Institut Français pour l’Exploitation de la Mer (IFREMER)

PhD-Awarding Institutions
Université de Bretagne Occidentale (UBO)
University of Tasmania (UTAS)

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Option 1

An economic approach to strategic assessment of interactions between offshore wind energy and commercial fisheries

Offshore wind energy has rapidly emerged as a promising source of renewable energy, but it also presents multiple challenges. This includes conflicts with fishing activities, resulting from the competition for space, as well as potential cascading effects resulting from fishing effort displacement, which can result in economic losses for the fishing industry. In the face of this challenge, the current approach to impact assessments and potential compensation has largely borrowed from the project-by-project impact assessment approaches used for land-based industrial developments. Given the fluidity of marine ecosystems and the adaptive capacity of the fishing industry, there is a need to develop systematic assessment methods and tools which enable assessing aggregate impacts across multiple projects, considering the potential interactions between the effects of individual projects. This implies evaluating the dynamics of spatial and economic responses of fishing activities to spatial exclusion, taking into account the ecological, economic and regulatory drivers, which influence these responses, as well as the governance regimes which could enable integrating such understanding in determining spatial allocation and compensation across sectors.

The project will develop an economic analysis of the complex interactions between wind energy development at sea and the structure of fishing activities, considering the cumulative impacts of multiple wind farm developments on spatial crowding of fishing areas, the associated changes in economic incentives for fishers, and the resulting changes in fishing activities. It will involve case studies of offshore wind energy developments and their interactions with commercial fishing in France and Australia. Surveys of key stakeholders will be carried out to gain insights into the main adaptive responses likely to be observed from the fishing industry following the implementation of wind energy projects, as well as drivers and constraints likely to influence these responses. Using the increasingly fine-resolution data available regarding the spatial distribution of commercial fishing activities and production as well as data relating to the economic operations of fishing fleets, the research will develop and apply spatial econometric modelling techniques to examine the potential impacts of alternative wind energy development scenarios at multiple scales (from local to regional), and assess cumulative impacts across projects. Results will be used to inform alternative approaches to factoring fishery impacts in the strategic planning of offshore wind development.

Option 2

An ecological-economic approach to strategic assessment of interactions between offshore wind energy and commercial fisheries

Offshore wind energy has rapidly emerged as a promising source of renewable energy, but it also presents multiple challenges. This includes conflicts with fishing activities, resulting from the competition for space, as well as potential cascading effects resulting from fishing effort displacement, which can result in economic losses for the fishing industry. In the face of this challenge, the current approach to impact assessments and potential compensation has largely borrowed from the project-by-project impact assessment approaches used for land-based industrial developments. Given the fluidity of marine ecosystems and the adaptive capacity of the fishing industry, there is a need to develop systematic assessment methods and tools which enable assessing aggregate impacts across multiple projects, considering the potential interactions between the effects of individual projects. This implies evaluating the dynamics of spatial and economic responses of fishing activities to spatial exclusion, taking into account the ecological, economic and regulatory drivers, which influence these responses, as well as the governance regimes which could enable integrating such understanding in determining spatial allocation and compensation across sectors.

The project will develop an ecological-economic analysis of the complex interactions between wind energy development at sea and the structure of fishing activities, considering the cumulative impacts of multiple wind farm developments on spatial allocation of fishing activities, and the associated changes in the marine populations supporting commercial fishing. It will involve case studies of offshore wind energy developments and their interactions with commercial fishing in France and Australia. Surveys of key stakeholders will be carried out to gain insights into the main adaptive responses likely to be observed from both the fishing industry and fish resources following the implementation of wind energy projects, as well as drivers and constraints likely to influence these responses. Building on existing ecological-economic simulation modelling frameworks developed by the partners and on the data and empirical models available to describe both fish population and fishing fleet dynamics, models will be developed which enable exploring the trade-offs associated with alternative offshore wind development scenarios.

Option 3

Analyzing the governance dimensions of managing interactions between offshore wind energy and commercial fisheries

Offshore wind energy has rapidly emerged as a promising source of renewable energy, but it also presents multiple challenges. This includes conflicts with fishing activities, resulting from the competition for space, as well as potential cascading effects resulting from fishing effort displacement, which can result in economic losses for the fishing industry. In the face of this challenge, the current approach to impact assessments and potential compensation has largely borrowed from the project-by-project impact assessment approaches used for land-based industrial developments. Given the fluidity of marine ecosystems and the adaptive capacity of the fishing industry, there is a need to develop systematic assessment methods and tools which enable assessing aggregate impacts across multiple projects, considering the potential interactions between the effects of individual projects. This implies evaluating the dynamics of spatial and economic responses of fishing activities to spatial exclusion, taking into account the ecological, economic and regulatory drivers, which influence these responses, as well as the governance regimes which could enable integrating such understanding in determining spatial allocation and compensation across sectors.

The project will explore the governance dimensions associated with the management of the complex interactions between wind energy development at sea and the structure of fishing activities. It will involve case studies of offshore wind energy developments and their interactions with commercial fishing in France and Australia. Surveys of key stakeholders will be carried out to gain insights into the main conflicts likely to arise from the implementation of wind energy projects due to changes in spatial allocation of fishing access and resource availability. The survey will also seek to gain an understanding of the current governance arrangements and stakeholder perceptions on possible evolutions in these arrangements. Building on existing frameworks for the analysis of cross-jurisdictional conflicts, and on the available data regarding fishing activities and resources, the research will consider the extent to which such conflicts can adequately be captured in frameworks for impact assessments of offshore wind developments. The results will be used to inform the design of alternative governance regimes and compensation mechanisms.

Olivier Thébaud
Emily Ogier
Steven Rust
Marcus Haward

Natural resource economics; spatial econometrics; Ecological-economic modelling; Institutional economics and governance analysis