[Coral-List] Comments on Draft Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement for Coral Restoration
Thomas Goreau
goreau at bestweb.net
Wed Jun 18 14:15:08 EDT 2008
Dear Alice Stratton,
I wish to correct serious inaccuracies in the draft statement on page
17, namely the section below:

The method described was invented by the late Prof. Wolf Hilbertz,
and developed and patented by him and myself over the last 20 years.
The citations given are mostly to unauthorized work that copied ours,
but which made serious errors of design, materials, and operating
conditions. They did not get the results that we, and those who we
train to use the method properly, routinely get in the field in
nearly 30 countries in the Caribbean as well as the Pacific, the
Indian Ocean, and South East Asia. We typically get growth increases
of electrified corals 2-6 times faster than uncharged controls, based
on 7 independent studies, but these depend on the species and the
operating conditions. Most of this work is in Indonesian, and we have
not had time to prepare a summary in English. In contrast, our
imitators have had much inferior results, and in fact some of those
you cite published a "peer" "reviewed" paper in which it was claimed
that they could only get corals to grow when the power was off!
But there is an even more important aspect of our work to restoration
following physical damage than enhanced growth rates, namely the
almost immediate healing of physical damage to tissue that our
electrical method promotes.
One of our students in Indonesia, transplanted 32 freshly broken
Acropora formosa tips from a single large clone onto Electrified
structures and 32 onto control uncharged structures. The electric
corals grew 4.01 times faster than the controls. But more important,
while the controls released mucus for two weeks after
transplantation, which is typical for physical damage, THE ELECTRIC
CORALS RELEASED NO VISIBLE MUCUS AND COULD BE SEEN BY EYE TO BE
OVERGROWING THE SUBSTRATE WITHIN HALF A DAY. The exceptionally rapid
wound healing caused by the direct current electrical field is
similar to that long known in vertebrates.
We routinely use this method in rescuing naturally broken coral
fragments for transplantation. Most of the natural fragments we use
were long ago damaged by anchors, divers,, waves, or fishing gear,
and when we get them many have been severely injured by rolling
around on rock or sand, often with much of the tissue dead or
necrotic. But when we put them onto electric nurseries the damaged
areas heal very rapidly, and the polyps quickly extend and start
feeding. The photos below taken by Leong Sze Wong at one of our
projects in Indonesia show broken corals that have had only one day
of electrical recuperation and were simply placed on a temporary
charged substrate without being attached, as this was simply a
temporary measure to restore them until they could be transplanted
onto a permanent electrified structure. Their vivid colors and
healthy polyp expansion of both hard and soft coral fragments are a
dramatic difference from how they were when we collected them a day
or two before.
In conclusion, the Biorock reef rehabilitation method is the best
practice for rescuing corals from physical damage, but it requires
prompt intervention for the best results. Whenever NOAA is serious
about using the best methods to rescue damaged corals, we will be
happy to show them how use our method properly. There are so few
corals left in the Keys that it is remiss not to use the best methods
for rescuing those that have been smashed by careless divers,
pleasure boaters, commercial shipping, or University of Miami
research vessels.
Best wishes,
Tom
Thomas J. Goreau, PhD
President
Global Coral Reef Alliance
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge MA 02139
617-864-4226
goreau at bestweb.net
http://www.globalcoral.org

Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2008 14:21:57 -0400
From: Alice Stratton <astratto at clam.mi.nmfs.gov>
Subject: [Coral-List] NOAA Coral PEIS for review
To: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
Cc: Coral PEIS <Coral.PEIS at noaa.gov>
Message-ID: <4856AF45.3090404 at clam.mi.nmfs.gov>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"
NOAA's National Marine Sanctuaries Program is seeking comments
on the
Draft Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement for
Coral
Restoration in the Florida Keys and Flower Garden Banks
National
Marine Sanctuaries. This document describes the methods
typically
used to implement restoration in response to physical
injuries. The
comment period is open until July 21, 2008. A PDF of the
document is
available from the Sanctuaries website at
[1]http://sanctuaries.noaa.gov/involved/ and hard
copies are
available upon request.
Please submit electronic comments to [2]coral.PEIS at noaa.gov.
Written
comments may also be sent to:
Alice Stratton
NOAA NMSP
212 Rogers Ave
Milford CT 06460
For additional information, please contact Alice
Stratton at
[3]coral.PEIS at noaa.gov or 203-882-6515.
References
1. http://sanctuaries.noaa.gov/involved/
2. mailto:coral.PEIS at noaa.gov
3. mailto:coral.PEIS at noaa.gov
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