Partnering with WREN, questionnaires are sent to offshore wind energy developers around the world who are involved in environmental monitoring. This page provides contextual project information and highlights environmental monitoring, providing links to available data and reports. Content is updated annually.

Gwynt y Môr

Description

Gwynt y Môr, or “wind of the sea” in Welsh, is an offshore wind farm located off the coast of Wales. The wind farm covers 79 square kilometers and is located near the North Hoyle and Rhyl Flats wind farms. Commissioned in June 2015, the 160-turbine farm is a joint venture between RWE Renewables (50%), Stadtwerke Munchen (30%), and Siemens Macquarie Infrastructure and Real Assets (20%).

Location

Gwynt y Môr is located in Liverpool Bay, 8 miles (13km) off the coast of Wales. The farm covers 79 square kilometers. There are two offshore substation platforms and the project’s export cables make landfall at a beech in Pensarn with a buried cable route to the substation near St Asaph in Denbighshire.

Licensing Information

  • February 11, 2015: Granted Offshore Electricity Transmission Licence under the Electricity Act 1989
  • January 12, 2015: Issued a Certificate pursuant to Section 10D of the Electricity Act 1989 by the Authority

Project Timeline

  • June 2015: Gwynt y Môr commissioned
  • November 2014: Construction completed
  • May 2013: First turbine installted
  • January 2012: Offshore Construction began
  • 2008: Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) gave approval for project

Key Environmental Issues

In 2015, the Gwynt y Môr Offshore Wind Farm established a £19 million fund to be used over the lifetime of the wind farm to help the nearby coastal communities of Conwy, Denbighshire, and Flintshire. As of 2023, the Gwynt y Môr Fund has surpassed the £5 million invested milestone, with 435 grants awarded so far. The fund is independently administered by Community & Voluntary Support Conwy (CVSC) in co-operation with Denbighshire and Flintshire Councils for Voluntary Services. Gwynt y Môr is not closed to fishing activities.

Metadata Documents

Gwynt y Môr is part ECOWind-ACCELERATE program.

Environmental Monitoring: Gwynt y Môr

Phase Stressor & Receptor Design and Methods Results Publications Data
Baseline Fish, Physical Environment Benthic Surveys
Grab sampling surveys for benthic characterization undertaken in 2002 and 2004.
Beam trawl surveys for benthic community (including epibenthic invertebrates and smaller demersal fish) characterization undertaken in December 2003, March and August 2004. 		Complete
Overall, benthic 487 taxa were recorded from a total of 326 samples at 296 sites. The results of the particle size analysis of samples collected across the Gwynt y Mor project area indicated that the seabed sediments are mainly composed of medium or coarse sands.
Overall, 3,681 individuals were caught from 41 fish taxa. In March 2004, scaldfish, dragonet, and dab were amongst the five most abundant fish species. In August 2004, dragonet and dab were again among the five most abundant species. The scaldfish, Arnoglossus laterna, occurred at 41 of 48 sites in December 2003 and 37 of 41 in March 2004. 		RWE Group 2005, Centre for Marine and Coastal Studies Ltd (CMACS) 2005

2003-2004, CMACS, Gwynt y Mor, Environmental Impact Assessment

2004-2005, Npwer Renewables Ltd, Gwynt y Mor, Environmental Statement
Baseline Marine Mammals Existing Literature and Data Review, Marine Mammal Surveys
Review of existing knowledge of marine mammal distribution in the eastern Irish Sea and Liverpool Bay conducted. Boat-based transect surveys across the project area employing visual observations and towed hydrophone recording conducted. Land-based surveys from the Great Orme Headland conducted.
Complete
Data review indicated that marine mammal density in and around the project area is likely to be at low levels.
Six species of cetasean are recorded as either present year round in the eastern Irish Sea or are recorded consistently as seasonal visitors. Harbour porpoise were the only cetacean recorded within the project area during the marine mammal surveys. Casual observations of common dolphin were reported within the project area on a single occasion during the benthic grab survey in 2004. 		RWE Group 2005

2004-2005, Npwer Renewables Ltd, Gwynt y Mor, Environmental Statement
Baseline Fish, Physical Environment Benthic Grab Survey and Analysis
The benthic grab sampling was completed by the survey vessel ‘Aquadynamic’ operating from Conwy Marina on a daily ‘port return’ basis during 21st-29th September 2010.
The camera survey was completed on 3rd October 2010 also by the survey vessel ‘Aquadynamic’ operating from Conwy Marina daily.
The trawling part of the survey programme was conducted by the vessel ‘Halcyon Days’ operating daily from the Port of Liverpool from 27th September-3rd October 2010. 		Complete
Four main sediment types were described from the survey area (sand, slightly gravelly sand, gravelly sand; and sandy gravel).
472 fish individuals from 23 species were recorded from the 30 trawl sites. Plaice, Pleuronectes platessa was the most recorded fish species with 86 individuals from 15 sites.
Thirty-nine epifaunal species were recorded from the survey with a total of 8,333 individuals. The common starfish, Asterias rubens was the mostly commonly recorded epifaunal species with 3,984 individuals recorded from all the survey sites except for Site 16. 		Centre for Marine and Coastal Studies Ltd (CMACS) 2010

2010-2011, Centre for Marine and Coastal Studies Ltd., (CMACS), Gwynt y Mor Offshore Wind Farm, Pre-construction Baseline Benthic Grab Survey
Operations Displacement, Habitat Change

Invertebrates 		Acoustic Telemetry
The study was conducted at Gwynt y Môr wind farm. Acoustic telemetry was used to monitor lobster positions from the 26th of June to the 10th of October 2021. Six Innovasea VR2W receivers (69 kHz) were deployed at each of three turbine locations with each receiver deployed 100 m away from the turbine. Lobsters used in the study were caught and released in two phases. 		Complete
After filtering for spurious detections, a total of 2,174,155 raw detections were recorded from tagged lobsters. Higher numbers of total detections were recorded for lobsters tagged and released in the first phase compared to those tagged and released in the second phase. Residency was high for most individuals. 		Thatcher et al. 2023 No data publicly available.