Posters
Come meet the poster presenters to ask them questions and discuss their work
We would like to invite you to come and see the posters at our upcoming conference. The posters will showcase a diverse range of research topics, and will give delegates an opportunity to engage with the authors and learn more about their work. Whether you are a seasoned researcher or simply curious about the latest developments in your field, we believe that the posters will offer something of interest to everyone. So please join us at the conference and take advantage of this opportunity to learn and engage with your peers in industry and the academic community.
PO042: Looking Beyond Species Counts: A More Complete Way to Measure Seafloor Health
Kersey Sturdivant, VP of Data Acquisition, Venterra Group
Abstract
Regulatory trends in Europe are moving quickly; the EU Nature Restoration Law and emerging frameworks for Biodiversity Net Gain and Nature-Positive Design are raising expectations. Offshore developers will increasingly need to demonstrate detailed baseline conditions and prove the effectiveness of net-gain or restoration measures. Environmental monitoring of subtidal benthic habitats has traditionally employed surveys where sediment is physically collected with a grab sampler. The taxonomic analysis of sediment grabs assesses the biodiversity of infauna communities by providing information on how many kinds of organisms exist within a given area (benthic community composition) and the quantity of those individuals (abundance). However, this approach does not make substantial inferences to relate presence and counts to biological activity and ecological value or function. The “end goal” of assessing benthic taxonomic biodiversity is to serve as a proxy for functional sediment health, with the assumption that increased biodiversity correlates with increased sediment function. Given the inherently dynamic and patchy nature of infaunal populations, species count data requires extensive replication (which is costly and time consuming), substantial transformations for normalization, and overextending inferences to relate species composition to function. Since the 1960s, ecological insights in benthic ecology have been driven by the use of acoustic and optical imaging technologies that provide direct functional context about the sedimentary environment in which infauna reside. Functional measures are easier to communicate to stakeholders and the public — “nutrient cycling,” “carbon storage,” or “resilience” resonate better than species counts. This connects the science to benefit-sharing and trust building, and the data collected better ties into the shifting regulatory environment. Optical cores (SPI) are visual, storable, reusable datasets, unlike grabs. This supports transparent, long-term monitoring across project phases (baseline → construction → operation → decommissioning).
No recording available for this poster.
