Multi-Disciplinary and Multi-Scale Assessment of Marine Renewable Energy Structure in a Tidal System

The French coast of the Atlantic and English Channel (EC) is promising for the development of Marine Renewable Energy (MRE), including wind, wave, and tidal stream, due to the high velocity of currents in some parts of the area. This paper, focusing on wind and tidal energy, discusses how the implementation of MRE converters influences biodiversity, and vice versa, through biofouling and reef effects. The understanding of these interactions requires the knowledge of the hydro-sedimentary conditions and the macrofauna. The research on these topics, performed at the Continental and Coastal Morphodynamic laboratory (M2C) (UNICAEN, France), is presented through a multi-disciplinary approach by i) studying the hydrodynamic conditions and the macrofauna in Alderney Race, ii) studying the biofouling effects on tidal turbines and their influence on the turbulent wake, iii) assessing the hydro-sedimentary impacts induced by the offshore wind farm, like scouring, and iv) taking an ecosystem approach on MRE, such as the reef effect. From an ecological perspective, the reef effect can be responsible for changes in the structure and function of the ecosystem. Although several studies have analyzed this effect at the species-or community-scale, the propagation of the reef effect at the ecosystem-scale remains unclear. Thus, understanding these ecosystem-scale effects is urgent for future research. From an engineering perspective, biofouling changes the structural characteristics (i.e., supplementary mass) of the converters and thus, affects their performance.