June 24, 2022 — Offshore wind projects off the East Coast could take up to a 15 percent bite out of the surf clam industry’s $30 million annual revenue, according to two new studies from Rutgers University researchers.
The biggest loss could be up to 25 percent for boats based in Atlantic City, N.J., a historic center for the fishery.
The paired studies, published in the ICES Journal of Marine Science, show how total fleet revenue may range from 3 percent to 15 percent, “depending on the scale of offshore wind development and response of the fishing fleet.”
The researchers developed a complex computer model to predict how the surf clam fishery may change in response to large-scale wind turbine arrays – such as the 1,100-megawatt Ocean Wind 1 project planned off Atlantic City.
“Understanding the impacts of fishery exclusion and fishing effort displacement from development of offshore wind energy is critical to the sustainability of the Atlantic surf clam fishing industry,” according to co-author Daphne Munroe, an associate professor in the Department of Marine and Coastal Sciences. Munroe and the research team worked closely with fishermen and the clam industry in developing the model.