Shallow Geology of the Western Otway Basin - Implications for Offshore Wind Farm Development

An understanding of the shallow geological succession is critical in terms of designing wind farm layouts and wind turbine generator (WTG) foundations. With respect to the western Otway Basin, the shallow geological succession is poorly understood, owing predominantly to a lack of high-resolution geophysical and geotechnical data. In lieu of suitable geophysical and geotechnical data, a thorough understanding of regional stratigraphy is crucial to identifying the possible range of soil and lithological units that may be present within the foundation zone, and to provide inputs to plan and optimize future geophysical and geotechnical site investigation campaigns. The shallow geological succession across the western Otway Basin is expected to be variable, likely composed of numerous possible stacked combinations of lithological units. Therefore, best practices, with respect to carbonate sediment characterisation for engineering design, through the integration of geophysical and geotechnical data, should be followed.