East Anglia Offshore Windfarm: Zonal Environmental Assessment Benthic Report
Figure 44c. Faunal group prediction across the whole EAOW zone, based on a likelihood model.
Figures 44a-c show the l ikelihood of the 10 faunal groups occurri ng across the a rea of interest, and show varyi ng degrees of coverage, some with high likelihood in just a small area (e.g. Faunal Group B) an d others showing almost full coverage (e.g. Faunal Group H). The differences are ex plained by the preference of each faunal group for different environmental conditions of the following 5 modelled layers:
Sediment
Biological zone Energy
Water body type Temperature
In general terms, the gr eater the co verage the less defined are the faunal group’s requirements for a parti cular habitat. More detail is provided below for each faunal group map:
Faunal Group A has a very specific habitat as it was only found on sand. Most of the predicted area is of high likelihood according to the sand distribution, which covers small patches of Area B and larger sections of Area A . The likelihood is only compromised in the central and southern sectors of Area B due to the Deep Circalittoral biological zone, Region of Freshwater Infl uence (ROFI) an d lower temperatures here whi ch are not us ed to define Faunal Group A (hence a lower
