Abstract
Iberdrola Energías Marinas de Cantabria is installing a Wave Energy Conversion (furthermore referred to as WEC) plant 4 Km northeast of Berria beach in Santoña, northern Spain. The buoy field will occupy a rectangular area of 800 by 600 m with the long side oriented towards the dominant wave direction. This paper analyses the impact of the plant in the nearshore dynamics. After an approximate evaluation of the WEC plant wave transmission, the available wave data base has been propagated to the coast with and without the presence of the WEC plant and the differences on wave height and direction, wave-driven currents and nearshore transport have also been evaluated and analysed. After the analysis of results, the impact of the plant on the nearshore dynamics has been found to be negligible. The methodology developed for this study can be applied to bigger WEC implementations where the impact on the coast’s morphodynamics could be noticeable.