Underwater noise emissions from a drillship in the Arctic

Line A Kyhn; Signe Sveegaard; Jakob Tougaard

doi:10.1016/j.marpolbul.2014.06.037

Underwater noise emissions from a drillship in the Arctic

Mar Pollut Bull. 2014 Sep 15;86(1-2):424-433. doi: 10.1016/j.marpolbul.2014.06.037. Epub 2014 Jul 17.

Authors

Line A Kyhn¹, Signe Sveegaard², Jakob Tougaard²

Affiliations

¹ Aarhus University, Department of Bioscience, DK-4000 Roskilde, Denmark. Electronic address: lky@dmu.dk.
² Aarhus University, Department of Bioscience, DK-4000 Roskilde, Denmark.

PMID: 25044041
DOI: 10.1016/j.marpolbul.2014.06.037

Abstract

Wideband sound recordings were made of underwater noise emitted by an active drillship, Stena Forth, working in 484 m of water in Baffin Bay, western Greenland. The recordings were obtained at thirty and one-hundred meters depth. Noise was recorded during both drilling and maintenance work at ranges from 500 m to 38 km. The emitted noise levels were highest during maintenance work with estimated source levels up to 190 dB re 1 μPa (rms), while the source level during drilling was 184 dB re 1 μPa (rms). There were spectral peaks discernible from the background noise to ranges of at least 38 km from the drillship with the main energy below 3 kHz. M-weighted sound pressure levels were virtually identical to broadband levels for low-frequency cetaceans and about 5 dB lower for high-frequency cetaceans. Signals from the dynamic positioning system were clearly detectable at ranges up to two km from the drillship.

Keywords: Greenland; M-weighting; Marine mammals; Noise pollution; Oil and gas exploration; Transmission loss.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Bays
Greenland
Humans
Noise*
Oil and Gas Industry / methods*
Pressure*
Sound Spectrography