Posted on January 6, 2022
A healthy waterways project planned for Gladstone Harbour aims to recreate marine habitats to encourage fish communities and improve the harbour’s water quality.
Key points:
- A collaborative effort to design seawalls is aimed at ensuring the ongoing sustainability of the Gladstone Harbour
- Improved water quality and increased habitats for marine life are some of the potential benefits of the work
- The project is focusing on “putting things back” into the environment
Gladstone in central Queensland is home to one of the world’s busiest bulk commodity ports, but its harbour has a sketchy environmental record.
But a new project involving researchers from Central Queensland University (CQU) and the Gladstone Ports Corporation aims to design seawalls to improve the port’s long-term sustainability.
Using ecological engineering, the team would be “working with nature” to create marine habitats adjacent to the seawalls.
“Some of the coastal development that happens, you have to build hard structures and within the ports, and basically they’re put in the structure for wharfs,” the director of CQU’s Coastal Marine Ecosystems Research Centre (CMERC) Emma Jackson said.
“The project we’re looking at is how can you develop those? How can you construct these things so you’re constructing and designing them to increase the amount of habitat you’re creating at the same time?”
Dr Jackson said it would bring new life back to the area.
“You’re putting some of these incredible habitats back that are doing all sorts in terms of fish habitat, sequestering carbon,” she said.
“It can improve the strength and the actual structural components of those seawalls and other hard structures in the port.”
The research could also have implications for future development along coastlines.
“That includes looking at ways in which we can solve problems to allow people to develop coastlines and build that sort of coastal economy for communities,” Dr Jackson said.
A chequered past
Gladstone Harbour has a chequered past when it comes to water quality.
In its sixth annual report card, released earlier this year, the Gladstone Harbour Healthy Partnership gave the overall environmental condition of the harbour a B rating, its highest-ever rating after two consecutive years of C ratings.
A class action involving dozens of fishermen and businesses against the Gladstone Ports Corporation is due to be heard in 2022.
The claimants are seeking compensation, alleging dredging works a decade ago were not contained properly and killed fish in the harbour.
Gladstone Conservation Council coordinator Anna Hitchcock said that disturbance to the harbour has a direct impact on water quality.
“In recent years, there hasn’t been a lot of disturbance to the harbour,” Ms Hitchcock said.
“Basically, the water quality is reasonable, as long as the silt at the bottom of the harbour isn’t disturbed.”
In a statement, the Gladstone Ports Corporation (GPC) said it had signed a memorandum of understanding last year with CQU to work together to become leaders in port research and operations.
“The MoU assists GPC’s mission in creating a sustainable future underpinned by a 50-year master plan,” it said.
“GPC remains committed to operating in a socially, sustainably and economic manner and is proud to be collaborating with CQU to undertake independent and industry-relevant research in the region.”
Dr Jackson said the seawall project would have a big impact on water quality.
“We’re increasing the amount of vegetative coastal habitats that you have, so it almost creates a buffer. It creates a way of filtering out things that are in the system, they can get collected and captured,” she said.
Ms Hitchcock said while this type of work could improve water quality, rigid structures such as seawalls can also have unintended consequences for marine environments.
“[For example] in a marine environment, you can get sand moving into unexpected places, we see that on beaches sometimes when there’s breakwaters, and then the sand washes away behind the breakwater and has to be artificially reinstated,” she said.
A step towards sustainable development
Dr Jackson said it was a big step forward in sustainable development.
“As industry grows and as our coastline develops, a lot of construction is required and a lot of development, which would mean losses in some of these coastal habitats,” she said.
“If you can incorporate that into the design of the seawalls and to have mangroves, oysters, creating soft sediment areas where sea grasses might grow. It means that you’re not removing these things as you develop.
“As you start to increase the area of footprints of the ports, you’re actually putting some things back.”
