2024, The Crown Estate, Whole of Seabed Programme, Summary Methodology Report series https://portal.medin.org.uk/portal/start.php?tpc=015_41ed577f-76e1-4681-b741-3542f0dfcc92 The Whole of Seabed Programme is an ongoing, iterative process of data collection, spatial analysis and stakeholder engagement. It aims to provide a highly sophisticated understanding of how the UK might utilise its marine resources to 2050, including a more detailed spatial understanding of marine resources than has ever been available in the UK before. The Programme is exploring different future-facing spatial scenarios about how the seabed might be used, to better understand the marine environment’s role in achieving net zero, as well as supporting thriving marine ecosystems and economies to 2050. Our analysis maps potential areas of opportunity across English, Welsh and Northern Irish waters for a wide range of sectors, for example, carbon capture and storage, marine aggregates, offshore wind, other marine energies, and telecommunication cables. Critically, the analysis considers the protection and restoration of nature as an activity and fundamental goal in its own right, rather than solely considering the potential future impact of other sectors on nature. The Programme represents a unique ambition to consider the diverse objectives of different sectors to 2050 and how they might interact. The scenarios we model allow us to understand the various possible interactions across our marine environment, the challenges they might pose, as well as potential enabling actions to resolve them through long-term collaborative planning. The outputs of the Programme constitute high quality spatial evidence informed by hundreds of spatial datasets, providing a clearer understanding of the areas required to support offshore and coastal sectors, as well as the marine environment. We will look to communicate this understanding by engaging both on the spatial outputs but crucially the statistics, caveats and issues they highlight for further discussion. The following report summarises the methodology used to date in the Whole of Seabed Programme. 20240805T14:12:12 20240714T00:00:00