Environmental interactions of wave and tidal energy generation devices

Renewable energy developments (wave, tidal stream and barrage/fence) are likely to become important  features of the OSPAR area. The likely ecological impacts of barrages/fences are  large  and  reasonably  well understood, but the impacts of wave, and particularly tidal stream, devices, are much less predictable and have the potential to be significant for some groups of organisms. It is important that the results of thorough monitoring of early deployments of wave and tidal stream devices are published and used to guide the management of subsequent developments.