Projected cross-shore changes in upwelling induced by offshore wind farm development along the California coast

Autor: Kaustubha Raghukumar, Timothy Nelson, Michael Jacox, Christopher Chartrand, Jerome Fiechter, Grace Chang, Lawrence Cheung, Jesse Roberts
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2023
Předmět:
Zdroj: Communications Earth & Environment, Vol 4, Iss 1, Pp 1-12 (2023)
Druh dokumentu: article
ISSN: 2662-4435
DOI: 10.1038/s43247-023-00780-y
Popis: Abstract In California offshore waters, sustained northwesterly winds have been identified as a key resource that can contribute substantially to renewable energy goals. However, the development of large-scale offshore wind farms can reduce the wind stress at the sea surface, which could affect wind-driven upwelling, nutrient delivery, and ecosystem dynamics. Here we examine changes to upwelling using atmospheric and ocean circulation numerical models together with a hypothetical upper bound buildout scenario of 877 turbines spread across three areas of interest. Wind speed changes are found to reduce upwelling on the inshore side of windfarms and increase upwelling on the offshore side. These changes, when expressed in terms of widely used metrics for upwelling volume transport and nutrient delivery, show that while the net upwelling in a wide coastal band changes relatively little, the spatial structure of upwelling within this coastal region can be shifted outside the bounds of natural variability.
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