Report of Technical Committe I.1: Environment

The report is the continuation of the work of the previous Technical Committee in charge of Environment, with a revised mandate which recognize the importance of environmental data to the planning of operation and prediction of operability. The report reflects trends in the technical literature during the past three years, the revised mandate and the interest of the Committee membership. Section 2 focuses on sources of environmental data for wind, waves, current and ice: Section 3 focuses on modelling of environmental data and Section 4 discusses some selected special topics. Section 5 addresses some selected aspects regarding the application of environmental data to design and operations. Section 6 summarize some of the most significant aspects of the report. Two special topics addressed in section 4 merit particular attention. These are rogue waves and climate change. There is increasing evidence for climate change impacts elsewhere in the marine environment that are of interest to ISSC and the marine design/operating communities. The mounting evidence for climate change also suggests that it may be appropriate on a case-by-case basis to review and question the underlying presumption of stationary climate typically applied to the extrapolation of design extremes. Depending on the planned service life of some projects, the trends in some variables may become important and perhaps should not be ignored as is often the current practice.