A new addition to the Tethys platform is live supporting the international collaborative project WREN. WREN (Working Together to Resolve ENvironmental Effects of Wind Energy) is an initiative under the International Energy Agency (IEA) Wind Committee to address the environmental issues associated with the development of land-based and offshore wind energy projects. Of particular interest to WREN and its collaborators is the need to better understand and resolve interactions between wildlife and wind turbines during installation and operational phases. WREN is led by the US and includes collaborative efforts of ten countries: France, Germany, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
WREN supports the Tethys Knowledge Base and Map Viewer, making over 1800 scientific papers and reports on wind and wildlife interactions available broadly. Using Tethys, you can now filter the database for papers that are specific to land-based wind energy, with a strong focus on birds and bats; or for papers on offshore wind, with a focus on birds and bats as well as marine animals.
WREN is also a platform for collaboration and outreach. WREN hosts quarterly environmental webinars on wind energy and wildlife interactions by experts in the field; presentations from these webinars are archived on Tethys. Connections to practitioners in the wind energy field, analogous databases, and a look at regulations that govern wind development in different nations, are hosted on Tethys as well. These and other aspects of the work of WREN can be accessed off the Tethys homepage, or directly at the About WREN page.
A major aspect of WREN’s work is the preparation of white papers on topics around the interaction of wind energy and wildlife that continue to challenge wind community, at a time when land-based and offshore wind farms are under development in many countries. The first of the white papers will be published over the next few months and will be hosted on Tethys. Shorter summaries of the white papers will also be produced for distribution through Tethys.
Like other areas of Tethys, our team is always looking for feedback on any part of Tethys, including the use of the site, additions to the database, and the preferred future direction we might take with Tethys, through the comment boxes available on each page. For more information on WREN, contact Karin Sinclair, Andrea Copping, or Jocelyn Brown-Saracino.