Scientific studies have revealed that used tires are covered with hydrocarbons which, when released into the waters, can pose a serious hazard to marine life.
THE Philippines, along with two nearby countries, continue to dump old tires to sea bottoms to make them habitats for marine life.
This was revealed by Endangered Species International (ESI), a fish species protection group that maintains its artificial coral reefs in certain coastal waters in Mindanao.
While the Philippines had over 60,000 tires dislodged to seabed since the country began setting up artificial reefs in 1977 in Central Visayas using tires and bamboo, its neighbors Indonesia, and Malaysia had sent even more old tires.
The Philippines, Malaysia, and Indonesia make up the Coral Triangle in Southeast Asia.
Their coral reef resources used to be among those envied by many countries for their vibrant marine life: those thousands of commercial fish species, among them the most wanted of all tuna.
And these countries have yet to decide whether to halt their tire reef programs or to proceed with them despite the negative results from using discarded tires as fish habitats.
Scientific studies have revealed that used tires are covered with hydrocarbon.
“When they break up over time, they release heavy metals into the environment that are toxic for marine life, according to Jacky Bonnenains, from the Robin Hood environmental pressure group.
It was in the 1980s, three years after the Philippines began using tires for its artificial reefs, that Malaysia and Indonesia mounted their artificial reef programs using an enormous number of old tires to boost their fishery resources.
Meanwhile, the need to install artificial coral reefs in critical Philippine coastal waters was prompted by natural reefs that have been badly damaged for several reasons.
Intensive and destructive fishing methods such as blasting, use of cyanide, ‘moru-ami’, gleaming, and spearfishing were among the reasons 70 percent of the country’s 34,000 square kilometers of natural coral reefs have been damaged.
Muro-ami photo by diuvsdejesus2014
Muro-ami or muroami is a fishing technique employed on coral reefs in Southeast Asia.
It uses an encircling net together with pounding devices. These devices usually comprise large stones fitted on ropes that are pounded into the coral reefs, according to Wikipedia.
Coral reefs have also been destroyed by sedimentation because of deforestation and poor land-use practices.
When corals are buried in silt from deforested areas carried by the current from shallow waters, they eventually die.
The giant anchors dropped from ships while they briefly stopped in shallow waters have dragged across a wide area of reefs, crushing corals that stood on their paths.
ESI has revealed that the Coral Triangle countries have yet to follow the initiatives of countries such as the United States in retrieving the two million old tires it sent down the oceans for marine life sanctuaries and habitats.
ESI is maintaining a fish coral reef system in the waters of Mindanao as part of its advocacy on fish conservation and marine habitat protection.
The US had found that its artificial reef program using 2,000,000 tires on the coast of Florida was an enormous failure.
The tires were deployed to create several artificial reef sites beginning in the 1970s.
The only option for the US government was to retrieve them at an enormous cost and reuse them as fuel to generate power, and landfill in pellet form. The cleanup began in 2008.
US experts discovered that majority of the marine life did not take to the man-made reefs as their permanent home, and just went there as transients and visitors.
Only a small portion stayed put to spawn and made the artificial reefs their new habitat.
Over time, however, the 2,000,000 tires that were bound in many clusters called artificial reef modules loosened up and were swept away by sea currents in all directions.
Many of these wayward tires swept across the reefs, crushing corals on their paths. Many of them surfaced on beaches.
In 1995, Hurricane Opal dislodged and spread over 1,000 tires onto the Florida Panhandle, and in 1998 Hurricane Bonnie deposited thousands of tires onto the North Carolina beaches.
In the Coral Reef Triangle, Malaysia and Indonesia found to their dismay that the tires they built as fish sanctuaries would later litter their beaches every after strong typhoons.
But a move to uproot the tires from where they have been planted has not been thought of, so far.
Accepting that it failed in its artificial reefs using discarded tires, the US in 2008 began retrieving 62,000 tires from their watery graves on the coast of Florida.
The cleanup lasted up to 2015, although there are still hundreds of thousands to be hauled up and brought to the recycling plant.
In the past 40 years, over 200 artificial reefs of tires were built worldwide, including France, Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, and the US.
A 1995 Philippine scientific paper titled Low-cost Artificial Reef Program in the Philippines and Evaluation in the Management ofa Tropical Coastal CEco- system offered observations:
1. Tire reefs have low productivity than bamboo reefs. However, reef modules made of bamboo also failed as they did not last and were swept away easily during a strong shift of undercurrent during typhoons.
2. Chemical analysis of tires shows that as it decays in water, it produces toxic compounds that cause problems to the aquatic system.
3. This could be a significant factor for halting the settlement of coral organisms and hindering fishes and marine organisms from using artificial reefs as their permanent habitats.
In short, ESI stressed, tires simply do not provide successful habitats for fish.
“Most used tires are coated with hydrocarbons that decompose over time, releasing toxic heavy metals into the sea and the food chain.”
The group had branded the artificial reef projects as “short-sighted unscientific planning strategies”.
ESI has observed that the round bald surface of old tires does not easily fit into the natural environment and is unsuitable for use by marine life.
“After all, artificial reefs for fish and other life-forms work best when they mimic natural reefs: jagged rocks, undulating ocean floors, and natural outcroppings provide overhangs and caves that fish and other marine life, such as seals, sea snakes, turtles, and clams, used to protect themselves from predators,” ESI said.
“It’s been discovered that successful artificial reefs concentrate fish populations in or near them, attracting both predators and prey fish populations around the reef, but robbing nearby natural habitats of their species.
“In effect, such ‘tire colonies’ help produces an imbalanced environment instead of becoming an integral part of the natural habitat,” ESI said.
Some observed that fish that thrive and are caught in artificial reefs are the barracuda, Spanish mackerel, surgeonfish, jacks, sweetlips, groupers, and rabbitfish.
Recommendations
The Philippine paper has recommended the following initiatives to help artificial reef projects meet their target of increasing fish population in coastal municipalities:
1. Stop the construction and if remove the already dropped tires for ecological reasons.
2. Continue construction of bamboo artificial reefs as a source of income for the small fishermen until such time other alternatives and more economical means have been developed.
3. Carry out studies and experiments using other available natural coastal materials such as carcar limestones for artificial reefs or the geoartificial reefs.
4. Use of cement as an artificial reef is not recommended because of its cost.
5. Encourage community involvement in the management and development of coastal resources.
6. Strict implementation of laws regarding the protection, maintenance, and management of the coral system.
Tags: #tires, #recycling, #marinelife, #artificialreefs