Abstract
With only a few wave and tidal devices in the water and no long-term post-installation data sets available, there continue to be uncertainties around risks to marine animals and habitats from the deployment and operation of marine renewable energy (MRE) systems [1], [2]. Based on these uncertainties and lack of familiarity with MRE devices, regulators and stakeholders continue to perceive a wide array of potential environmental interactions as risky; and they continue to require extensive monitoring programs to permit or license a project. The financial burden of monitoring is difficult for MRE developers to support, and it is not clear whether the planned data collection efforts are necessarily aimed at the most important interactions that present the highest levels of risk to the marine environment. It appears that an important pathway toward commercial development of MRE projects should include a delineation and evaluation of these risks.