Dear colleagues, Marine renewable energy sources (offshore wind, but increasingly tide and wave energy) are becoming increasingly attractive to exploit in many parts of the world, particularly in the light of increasingly stringent carbon reduction targets. There is, however, also a strong interest in determining potential environmental risks of these new technologies. As part of a consortium with the University of Exeter, the Scottish Association for Marine Science (SAMS) is currently undertaking a government-commissioned review of the potential for marine megafauna entanglement risk from renewable marine energy developments. This includes assessing the risks of marine mammals, basking sharks and marine turtles suffering injury or death due to entanglement within moorings, interconnector cables etc. These cables are typically considerably thicker (>5 cm) and stiffer than ropes and lines associated with the fishing industry, and at first glance would appear to offer fewer obvious means of entanglement. On behalf of my co-authors, I would hereby wish to ask the MARMAM community if anyone has come across any evidence (incl. anecdotal/grey literature) of marine mammals (or other megafauna) becoming entangled in thick cables, chains or moorings such as those associated with the offshore oil & gas sector, the aquaculture industry, or any other non-fisheries-related sources (eg. pontoons, floating marinas or navigational buoys). Any such records would help inform our assessment of the risks associated with this emerging and highly diverse sector, at least in terms of potential entanglement risks. Please do not hesitate to contact me directly via email (at Steven.Benjamins@sams.ac.uk) if you wish to share any such records with us, or if you have further questions. Once our review has been formally completed, a summary of our results will be provided on MARMAM. Many thanks in advance for your assistance. Yours truly, Steven Benjamins _____________________________________________________________________________________ Dr. Steven Benjamins Post Doctoral Research Associate SAMS (Scottish Association for Marine Science) Oban Argyll Scotland UK PA37 1QA Tel: +44(0)1631-559449 (office) Tel: +44(0)1631-559000 (switchboard) Fax: +44(0)1631-559001 E-mail address: Steven.Benjamins@sams.ac.uk http://www.sams.ac.uk