Production platforms in 2007 incl. 5 km circle (Poot et al. 2008)

1. Night-time obstruction lighting for offshore (and onshore) wind farms and birds: demands from different interest groups Development of concepts forthemarking of offshore wind farms Sub-project: Ecologicaleffects and natureconservation 11th European Symposium fortheProtection of theNight Sky6th - 8thOctober, 2011, Osnabrück, Germany

3. Offshore structures, – more lights in the sea… Production platforms in 2007 incl. 5 km circle (Poot et al. 2008)

4. Proposed offshore wind farm areas in Europe; database: www.4coffshore.com German EEZ: 26 permitted and 62 proposed each with 40- 100 wind turbines (Status 2010)

5. For birds it may look like this: Alphaventus offshore wind farm North Sea

6. … or more like this? in a formerly pitch dark environment … … we simply don‘t know!

7. Development of concepts for the marking of offshore wind farms Obstruction lighting concept – complying with safety rules Assessment shipsafety Assessment airsafety Assessment ecologicaleffects Assessment economic effects Riskanalysis protectiongoals, trafficcensus, analysiscollisionrisks, comparisonwithotherobstacles at sea Riskanalysis protectiongoals, trafficcensus, analysiscollisionrisks, comparisonwithotherobstacles at sea Assessment report protectiontargets disturbancefactors, mitigation / compensation researchneeds Costevaluations protectiontarget, investments, installation, costs of power, maintenance, repair evaluations - identification of the options examples from other countries Proposal for a obstruction lighting concepts offshore wind farms iterative process for validiation appraisal of regulations and legal aspects state of the scientific and technical knowledge

8. Windturbines will bemarked, • onshorewithaviationlightingonly • offshore withlightingforairplanes and ships.

9. Safetyshippingtraffic - IALA (International CivilAviationOrganization) • yellowlights - blinking – corner, periphery (5 nm) • yellowmarkings / paint plus light (near)

10. Safetyairtraffic - ICAO (International Association of Marine Aids to • Navigation and LighthouseAuthorities) • red light on nacell , • moreredlightsdepending on turbineheight:redlights at thetower and at the blade tips (upper 120°)

11. Offshore scenario 77 turbines > 150 m high

12. Nature conservation protection targets • Impact by obstruction lighting of offshore wind farms means, that individual birds are - killed due to markings / lighting (collision, exhaustion) or - disturbed (desorientation, distraction, loosing fitness). • Goal: • It shall be avoided, that additional mortality by obstruction lighting will negatively affect the population status.

13. Where are migrating birds flying? • waterbirds like seaducks, divers, auks: preferablyoverwater • other waterbirds: overwater, but long-distancestraightlines

14. Thomas W. Johansen • Whereare birds flying? • daytimemigrants • here long-distancemigrantHoneybuzzard (Hake et al., 2003) • same routesapplytosongbirds

15. Where are migrating birds flying? • daytimemigrants– birds of prey, othersoaring birds, somespecies of songbirds- narrow front migrationguidedbytopographicfeatures; - cross large waterbodies at shortestdistance Thomas W. Johansen

16. Where are migrating birds flying? • night-time migrants – mainlysongbirds, somewaders and other waterbirdsbroad-front migration at all altitudes, limited leadinglineeffects

17. Where are migrating birds flying? • night-time migrants – mainlysongbirds, somewaders and other waterbirdsbroad-front at all altitudes, limited leadinglineeffects

18. Whenarethey in theair? Migration intensities per season (Fehmarn 2009) spring autumn Thomas W. Johansen

19. Whenarethey in theair? Migration intensities per day and night, altitude (Fehmarn 2010) night day

20. How manyarethere? • Nightmigration: e.g. breeding populations Sweden and Finland (incl. bothpartners plus 2 young per pair) – ~ 400 Mio, mostlysongbirds; • Day migration: e.g. waterbirds > 10 Mioindividualsfrom a much larger regionplus otherdaymigrants • MANY!

21. Do they collide? They do! onshore: Bonn Post-Tower (Haupt 2009)

22. Do they collide? They do! Offshore: Fino 1 (Aumüller et al., 2011)

23. Weknow, whencollisionratesare high • An example: Goodmigrationconditions in Scandinavia – tailwind; turningbadoverthe North Sea – headwind, lowvisibility

24. Weknow, whencollisionratesare high • An example: Goodmigrationconditions in Scandinavia – tailwind; turningbadoverthe North Sea – headwind, lowvisibility • birds come down, areattractedbylights, collide

25. Attraction depends on visibility Schulz A, Kulemeyer C, Röhrbein V, Coppack T (2011) The extent of phototactic attraction of night-migrating birds passing an illuminated mast in the western Baltic Sea. NINA Report 693:102

26. What about light? How it could be… detection / perception reaction desorientation „trapping“

27. Whatexactly do weknowabout light and birdmigration? • light intensity – theless, thebetter e.g. Marquenie & Laar 2004 NL Shell Lighthouse studies etc.

28. Whatexactly do weknowabout light and birdmigration? • light colour – resultsarecontradicting- redisfoundtoattract and causedesorientation (NL, Poot et al., 2008)- greenisfoundtoattract (USA, Evans et al., 2007) Marquenie et al., 2006 – NL, Shell

29. Whatexactly do weknowabout light and birdmigration? • flashing / steady (colour) • Studies at USA comm. towers 100 – 300 m (Gehring et al.,2009) • Avoidingsteady light canreducecollisionsby 50-70%. • A) strobewhite • B) strobered • C) flashingred • D) flashing plus non-flashing

30. Birds ascollisionvictims due to light: What do weknow, whatismissing? • birds areattractedbylights – and collide; • „trappingeffects“ – increasethecollisionrisk; • flashingispreferred; • estimatedcollisionnumbers: - onshore: 2 to 60 per turbine and year (datafrom Germany and USA) • offshore: nocturnalmigratingsongbirds: 100 to 1,000 per turbine and year (calculated, Bellebaum et al., 2010)

31. Birds ascollisionvictims due to light: What do weknow, whatismissing? • Missingare: • quantitative results on avoidancebehaviour, attractioneffects, truecollisionrates; • altitudedistributions and migrationdepending on regional and localweather • coloureffects

32. What have we learned from each other? Regulations are not binding, there is room for flexibility. e.g. no additional lights for turbines above 150 m; e.g. for self-reflective ID markings instead of lit areas; e.g. transponder techniques (for turning lights on). A compromise can be found between safety issues and a „dark sky“ = less bird collisions.

33. Thank you! Thomas W. Johansen

35. Poot et al. 2008

36. Light aspectswithregardto birds: • light colour • fromWiltschko et al. 2010)

37. Um welche Beleuchtung geht es? • Seefahrt / Schiffssicherheit (Empfehlung IALA; WSD): - Tageskennzeichnung – wird nachts beleuchtet (Blendeffekte) Nearshore Anlage BARD 5.0 beiHooksiel. Kennzeichnung / Befeuerung Stützkreuz (aus Kumbartzky 2009: Präsentation EKKO Workshop).