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1.
PeerJ ; 11: e14745, 2023.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-36710861

ABSTRACT

Submarine power cables carry electricity over long distances. Their geographic distribution, number, and areal coverage are increasing rapidly with the development of, for example, offshore wind facilities. The flow of current passing through these cables creates a magnetic field (MF) that can potentially affect marine organisms, particularly those that are magnetosensitive. The lumpfish (Cyclopterus lumpus) is a migratory species that is widely distributed in the North Atlantic Ocean and Barents Sea. It migrates between coastal spawning grounds and pelagic offshore feeding areas. We tested whether lumpfish respond to MFs of the same intensity as those emitted by high voltage direct current (HVDC) submarine power cables. Laboratory experiments were conducted by placing juvenile lumpfish in an artificial MF gradient generated by a Helmholtz coil system. The intensity of the artificial MF used (230 µT) corresponded to the field at 1 m from a high-power submarine cable. The fish were filmed for 30 min with the coil either on or off. Swimming speeds, and presence in the different parts of a raceway, were extracted from the videos and analyzed. Juvenile lumpfish activity, defined as the time that the fish spent swimming relative to stationary pauses (attached to the substrate), and the distance travelled, were unaffected by exposure to the artificial MF. The swimming speed of juvenile lumpfish was reduced (by 16%) when the coil was on indicating that the fish could either sense the MF or the induced electric field created by the movement of the fish through the magnetic field. However, it seems unlikely that a 16% decrease in swimming speed occurring within 1 m of HVDC cables would significantly affect Atlantic lumpfish migration or homing.


Subject(s)
Perciformes , Swimming , Animals , Fishes , Magnetic Fields , Atlantic Ocean
2.
PNAS Nexus ; 1(4): pgac175, 2022 Sep.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: mdl-36714825

ABSTRACT

High-voltage direct current (HVDC) subsea cables are used to transport power between locations and from/to nearshore and offshore facilities. HVDC cables produce magnetic fields (B-fields) that could impact marine fish. Atlantic haddock (Melanogrammus aeglefinus) is a demersal fish that is at risk of exposure to anthropogenic B-fields. Their larvae drift over the continental shelf, and use the Earth's magnetic field for orientation during dispersal. Therefore, anthropogenic magnetic fields from HVDC cables could alter their behavior. We tested the behavior of 92 haddock larvae using a setup designed to simulate the scenario of larvae drifting past a B-field in the intensity range of that produced by a DC subsea cable. We exposed the larvae to a B-field intensity ranging from 50 to 150 µT in a raceway tank. Exposure to the B-field did not affect the spatial distribution of haddock larvae in the raceway. Larvae were categorized by differences in their exploratory behavior in the raceway. The majority (78%) of larvae were nonexploratory, and exposure to the artificial B-field reduced their median swimming speed by 60% and decreased their median acceleration by 38%. There was no effect on swimming of the smaller proportion (22%) of exploratory larvae. These observations support the conclusion that the swimming performance of nonexploratory haddock larvae would be reduced following exposure to B-field from HVDC cables. The selective impact on nonexploratory individuals, and the lack of impact on exploratory individuals, could have population-scale implications for haddock in the wild.

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