Marinet has published a paper titled Marine Aggregate Extraction — The Need to Dredge: Fact or Fiction?
This publication is linked to Marinet’s ongoing work to secure the end to offshore dredging for marine sand and gravel (aggregate for the building industry), and to replace these virgin raw materials with recycled ones.
David Levy, Marinet chair , said: “ This new Marinet paper is available for consideration by all parties. Its purpose is to inform and widen the debate. Sourcing sand and gravel from the seabed is enormously damaging to the marine environment.
“It causes major long-term damage to fish spawning and nursery grounds, and many believe that its role in coastal erosion is far from blameless.
“The tragedy of this situation is that the UK aggregate companies have insisted on investing, with approval by the Government, in marine dredging when actually the technology exists to wholly source sand from recycled quarry waste. This is not pie in the sky hyperbole. It is fact. Japan now sources the overwhelming majority of its sand to make concrete from quarry waste, and has been a pioneer in developing this new technology. Australia is on the brink of following suit,” concluded Levy.