Auckland Council have awarded the Mussel Reef Restoration Trust / Revive Our Gulf project seed funding from their Waste Minimisation & Innovation Fund (WMIF) to complete a business case on the feasibility of running a shell recycling programme. The programme has potential to see shell from mussels and oysters diverted from landfill (and other uses) for use in mussel reef restoration in the Hauraki Gulf.
Shell will be used – and lots of it – for reef building. Shell provides a solid base for newly deployed mussels, elevating them out of the silt and sediment. Also, mussel larvae/spat is attracted to, and attaches to shell.
Revive Our Gulf hopes to establish this programme in the not too distant future, recovering shell from seafood processors and eventually wholesalers.
ENDS