EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the second part of a two-part series on the Sequim Marine Research Operation for Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. The first installment appears here: https://www.peninsuladailynews.com/article/20101004/news/310049996/wind-tides-hold-economic-potential-top-lab-chief-says
SEQUIM BAY — While there is plenty of research and information about how electromagnetic fields from power lines affect animal life on land, it is unknown how marine life would respond to tidal turbines on the ocean floor.
That’s why super-sized electromagnetic coils are being used in an experiment in the aquatic lab at the Sequim Marine Research Operation for Pacific Northwest National Laboratory near the mouth of Sequim Bay, said Charlie Brandt, the lab’s director.
The extensive research project will help explain how fish and invertebrates — such as salmon, halibut, crabs and sea anemones — respond to exposure to electromagnetism, and whether it affects their behavior, including reproduction and growth.
“We’re working to make sure that ocean energy development can be done in a way that is compatible with environmental sustainability,” Brandt said.
Research began this summer and will continue for two years, he said.
The work is leading up to the Snohomish County Public Utility District’s deployment in 2012 of two 400-ton tidal turbines about a half-mile off Whidbey Island’s Admiralty Head in Admiralty Inlet.
Brandt said he expects the lab will have a post-deployment role in determining how the turbines affect marine life while the underwater machines operate.
The turbines resemble fans, sitting about 65 feet high on a triangular platform of about 100 feet by 85 feet, Snohomish PUD officials said.
The turbines will be lowered to about 200 feet deep.
Built by the Irish company OpenHydro, the turbines will generate enough energy for 700 homes, producing energy from the ocean’s nature ebb and flow, an abundant, constant energy source, said Brandt and other Sequim lab scientists.
Energy companies and utilities are examining several different technologies to harness energy from oceans and rivers.
Hydrokinetic devices, as they are known, would be similar to marine power devices, but generate power from free-flowing water in rivers and streams.
Each device generates electricity that travels through cables connecting it with a land power line.
Researchers want to know how the devices and their cables affect marine life.
The research project uses two specially designed coils at the Sequim aquatic lab.
Called Helmholtz coils, each consists of about 200 pounds of copper wiring wrapped into a red window frame-like outline that’s roughly five-feet-by-five-feet and can be switched on like a light.
This creates an electromagnetic field that naturally attracts magnetic materials like iron, lab scientists said.
Researchers want to know if the electromagnetic field also will affect marine and estuarine animal behavior, including migration, finding food and avoiding predators.
Several aquatic animals — such as halibut, salmon and trout found in the regions waters — may use the Earth’s natural magnetic fields like a compass to navigate and detect their prey, Brandt said.
To test the field’s potential effects, aquarium tanks filled with marine species in the lab are being placed near the two coils.
Dana Woodruff, senior research scientist on the team leading the project, said four cameras will be mounted to observe the species in a controlled, walled-off space.
Researchers will activate the electromagnetic field at various strengths and time periods to see if the animals’ actions change, Woodruff said.
“The Dungeness crab is a good surrogate, an organism that lives on the bottom and moves around,” Woodruff said, looking over the experimental system outfitted with the coils, a Dungeness crab sitting inside a clear container with fresh seawater circulating through it.
The lab has a treatment system that is capable of producing water that can mimic that from anywhere in the world, Brandt said.
Researchers will observe whether the electromagnetic field interferes with the ability of juvenile coho salmon to recognize and avoid predators, he said.
Scientists will examine whether the fast, flicking movements of Dungeness crab antennules — the small antennae next to crabs’ eyes that help them detect odors — change when exposed to the electromagnetic field, Woodruff said.
The lab’s team will document whether the animals are attracted or repelled by the fields.
Brandt said most studies conducted so far have been done outside the U.S.
As part of the project, scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee are examining how electromagnetic fields created by hydrokinetic devices affect freshwater animals in rivers and streams.
PNNL, the Sequim Marine Sciences Lab and Oak Ridge National Laboratory are managed by Battelle, a nonprofit company that conducts $5 billion in annual research and development for the government and private sector.
Researchers from Northwest National Marine Renewable Energy Center at Oregon State University are also studying the potential electromagnetic effects on crabs.
The Sequim Marine Sciences Lab’s study is a component of Pacific Northwest Laboratory’s larger research effort to better understand the potential environmental impact of marine and hydrokinetic energy development.
PNNL researchers are also examining whether underwater noise from these devices could impact aquatic life, whether underwater animals could be injured by the rotating turbines in tidal power devices and how marine devices could impact the flow patterns of coastal waters.
The project is funded by the Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, Wind and Water Power Program.
“The resource is there,” Brandt said of ocean energy. “But we have to demonstrate there is not an environmental effect.”
________
Sequim-Dungeness Valley Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com.
