Abstract
Monitoring of early demonstration projects will benefit the industry of marine renewable energy by reducing uncertainty around environmental risks and informing sustainable commercial implementations. The Adaptable Monitoring Package (AMP) and Millennium Falcon deployment vehicle described here are designed to address the need for integrated, cabled instrumentation. By incorporating a flexible suite of instrumentation into a shrouded body with a single wetmate connector, the AMP has the power and data bandwidth afforded to cabled deployments while remaining easy to maintain. Instrumentation included in the initial AMP implementation will allow for monitoring of marine animal interactions, noise levels, current profiles and turbulence, and water quality in the near field of marine energy converters. The Millennium Falcon deployment vehicle, along with the docking station and launch platform, provides the support infrastructure for deployment and recovery of the AMP in the energetic conditions that are typical of marine energy sites. Operational procedures are designed to minimize risk to instrumentation and marine energy converters and the time required for deployment. Future potential for instrument integration and algorithm development makes the AMP well-suited to face the evolving needs of environmental monitoring around marine energy converters.