Calling for entries from companies and consortia interested to further develop Marine Scotland’s seabird sensitivity mapping tool, created under ORJIP Offshore Wind Stage 1.

The existing tool was delivered by the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (CEH) in June 2019, and is capable of estimating, for the Scottish coastline waters: a) the relative importance of a location for individual seabird species and species groups, b) the likelihood of birds at that location being from a SPA population, and c) their sensitivity to offshore wind farm developments. This report can be made available to potential bidders upon request.

This new project looks to further develop the tool, and will require the contractor to:

• expand the scope of the tool by incorporating additional datasets and improving it’s functionality;
• improve the tool’s flexibility in updating existing, and accepting new, distribution data (e.g. GPS and at-sea surveys);
• improve the tool’s transparency to make clear what underlying data the outputs are based on;
• address uncertainties and sensitivities in the tool;
• extend the tool’s geographical coverage to beyond Scotland;
• future proof the tool as reasonably as possible;
• make the tool publicly available online;
• provide 3rd party validation of the tool;
• prepare a manuscript for publication in a peer reviewed scientific journal.

Clarification questions should be received by 22 July 2020. Answers to these questions will be posted below by 29 July.

The closing date to receive tender submissions is 14 August 17:30 BST.

All clarification questions and tender submissions should be sent electronically, by their respective deadlines, to oliver.patrick@carbontrust.com.

The tender is also available to view on Public Contracts Scotland here.