Accelerating decarbonisation while safeguarding energy security requires a rapid scale-up of renewables. Offshore wind energy is central, and floating wind can unlock deep-water resources where bottom-fixed foundations are not feasible. Yet progress is constrained not by costs alone but by permitting complexity, delays in government auctions, grid access, environmental safeguards, and the sequencing of logistics and industrial capacity. The Mediterranean combines major technical potential with persistent structural barriers. This review offers a basin-specific, industry-oriented assessment integrating techno-economic feasibility, regulation, and industrial readiness. It addresses three cross-cutting questions on technical feasibility, regulatory acceleration, and industrial coordination, covering siting, permitting, finance, grids, and supply chains. We find that cost competitiveness is necessary but insufficient. Floating projects require dedicated rules, infrastructure, and financing frameworks distinct from bottom-fixed, while overall progress depends on clear floating-fit auction schedules, targeted infrastructure and port upgrades, and synchronised grids. Early, place-based engagement and nature-inclusive design are essential to feasibility. Many challenges are shared across offshore wind but amplified for floating by deeper waters and more complex logistics. Aligning planning, grid integration, industrial capability and social licence is decisive to turning the Mediterranean's offshore potential, driven mainly by floating wind and enabled by basin-wide coordination, into bankable projects at pace. ... Read more

The deployment of floating offshore wind turbines requires the installation of anchoring systems in deep-water environments, where pile driving operations may be performed using fully submerged impact hammers. While underwater noise from offshore pile driving has been widely studied, most existing approaches assume impacts occurring in air and may not entirely capture these emerging installation configurations. Furthermore, current assessment frameworks are primarily based on pressure-related acoustic metrics and do not explicitly account for particle motion. This study investigates the vibro-acoustic response of a driven pile under submerged impact conditions, with particular focus on particle motion in both the water column and the seabed. A physics-based modelling approach is adopted to analyse the coupled pile–soil–fluid system, capturing both the radiated acoustic field in the water and the vibration field transmitted through the seabed. The response is described in terms of particle velocity, enabling a consistent representation across both media. The results provide insight into the mechanisms governing energy transmission into the seabed, supporting a more comprehensive assessment of environmental effects in deep-water pile installation. ... Read more