Yesterday, BOEM officially launched the POWERON (Partnership for an Offshore Wind Energy Regional Observation Network) program, and partnerships with RWSC and NOAA Fisheries to implement it. RWSC will receive $4 million over 3 years to lead the program.Offshore wind lessees can now make annual contributions to POWERON to have their long-term passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) requirements fulfilled. Annual POWERON contributions will cover the cost of instrumentation, vessel time, data processing, and analysis. Contributions will also cover the costs of archiving data at a… [More]

Members from all four RWSC Sector Caucuses (federal, state, offshore wind industry, environmental NGOs) developed their first Offshore Wind & Wildlife Research Funding Strategy Action Plan. The purpose of the Action Plan is to summarize the state of ongoing and planned offshore wind and wildlife research and describe specific objectives for RWSC, funders, and all Sector Caucus members to ensure that data collection and research conducted in the upcoming year is coordinated and results in high quality data that fills current data needs. Given the current… [More]

As part of RWSC’s mission to facilitate coordinated research and analysis for wildlife, marine ecosystems, and offshore wind, the Data Governance Subcommittee has been working with other taxa- and habitat-focused RWSC Subcommittees to identify and recommend long-term storage options for each type of data described in RWSC’s Science Plan. In addition, entities that fund and/or require offshore wind and wildlife or environmental data collection and research have described a need for simple, long-term storage and access to data that they have funded, as well as easy and… [More]

View the recording of the Introduction to the RWSC Research Planning Map Webinar, held on August 14, 2024. The RWSC has launched “version 1.0” of a Research Planning Map that displays the locations (points, transects, areas) where wildlife and environment data are being collected to support offshore wind research. This version of the map is incomplete and does not represent all the ongoing research and data collection activities with respect to offshore wind. Learn more about the plan to build and maintain this tool. RWSC develops and maintains several resources… [More]

The RWSC Subcommittees will be on vacation during the month of July! In the meantime, here’s a quick rundown of their progress implementing Science Plan recommendations. For a full update, attend the RWSC Symposium on Day 1 of NYSERDA’s State of the Science Workshop on Offshore Wind Energy, Wildlife, and Fisheries (July 16-19): Across all Subcommittees: Advancing the development of the RWSC Research Planning Map, with public launch planned this summer. Reviewing, updating, and maintaining the Offshore Wind & Wildlife Research Database with the best available information… [More]