Offshore grid connections and the Wadden Sea: Environmental impacts and key mitigation action fields

In this report, environmental impacts and mitigation strategies are presented for cable and pipeline routes in the Wadden Sea, specifically focusing on safeguarding the Wadden Sea World Heritage Site's Outstanding Universal Value. By reviewing scientific literature, project-specific documents, policies, and ecological assessments, complemented by a workshop with stakeholders, the best available information has been collected to recommend best practices for policy makers to prevent damage to the Wadden Sea ecosystem.

This study is part of a TWSC project "North Sea wide acceleration of LANding offshore energy while mitigating Impact on the Coastal Environment", LANICE in short, aiming at supporting the achievement of the EU renewable energy targets and climate change mitigation goals whilst preserving the Wadden Sea World Heritage. LANICE’s objectives are to provide mitigation schemes to effectively reduce environmental impacts by looking into environmental conflicts and acceleration potentials for transmission grid projects for an environmentally sound energy transition. The project is in line with and supports the implementation of the Wilhelmshaven Declaration 2023 and The SIMP Integrated Management Plan for the ONE Wadden Sea World Heritage 2023 (Key topic Energy). The project is financed by the Next Generation EU and the Trilateral Wadden Sea Cooperation (TWSC).

The document is published via the external open source platform Zenodo. The "view" button below leads to the publication on Zenodo.