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The road to seagrass restoration at scale using engineering

Richard Unsworth Orcid Logo, Sam Rees

Ecological Engineering, Volume: 215, Start page: 107607

Swansea University Authors: Richard Unsworth Orcid Logo, Sam Rees

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DOI (Published version): 10.1016/j.ecoleng.2025.107607

Abstract

Seagrass restoration efforts have been ongoing for decades, with early innovations dating back to the 1970s. While there has been progress, many projects have high failure rates, but the consensus within the literature is that increasing spatial scale will lead to higher success rates. To achieve sc...

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Published in: Ecological Engineering
ISSN: 0925-8574 1872-6992
Published: Elsevier BV 2025
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URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa69141
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spelling 2025-03-24T09:58:32.8817457 v2 69141 2025-03-24 The road to seagrass restoration at scale using engineering b0f33acd13a3ab541cf2aaea27f4fc2f 0000-0003-0036-9724 Richard Unsworth Richard Unsworth true false 25809349ff4e207ac37ac3846a87b51c Sam Rees Sam Rees true false 2025-03-24 BGPS Seagrass restoration efforts have been ongoing for decades, with early innovations dating back to the 1970s. While there has been progress, many projects have high failure rates, but the consensus within the literature is that increasing spatial scale will lead to higher success rates. To achieve scaled-up restoration, innovation in the context of mechanised approaches is required that can reduce the costs and labour-intensive processes and improve reliability. This review paper focuses on the restoration of seagrass meadows and how engineering solutions have been used to help scale up these efforts. The paper examines the different stages within seagrass restoration and how mechanised approaches have been used to date, along with their levels of success or failure. Various stages of restoration are examined, from seed collection, separation, storage, planting, and the biological and environmental engineering challenges associated with upscaling these efforts. The review focuses primarily on Zostera species due to its dominance in the literature, but expands to other species where possible. Although extensive mechanised approaches have been used (e.g. seed planting sleds), a common thread through the studies remains the limited underpinning understanding of the biology to improve the use of these methods and a solid understanding of the relative merits of the use of these techniques. Despite innovations, seagrass restoration is still marked by high failure rates. More interdisciplinary work is required to link biological and engineering solutions to environmental variability for greater restoration success. Journal Article Ecological Engineering 215 107607 Elsevier BV 0925-8574 1872-6992 Seagrass; Scaling; Restoration; Recovery; Conservation 1 5 2025 2025-05-01 10.1016/j.ecoleng.2025.107607 Review COLLEGE NANME Biosciences Geography and Physics School COLLEGE CODE BGPS Swansea University SU Library paid the OA fee (TA Institutional Deal) The authors are grateful for the assistance of the following field volunteers and staff: Sam Petts, Poppy Disney, Eve Uncles, Stijn DenHaan and Conor Laing. In addition, the authors would like to thank the Garfield Western Foundation, Rebel Energy, the Heritage Lottery Foundation and the Moondance Foundation for their financial support of this project. The authors would also like to thank Ricardo Zanre and Jim Nicols at WWF, and Alison Palmer-Hargrave at the Penllyn-Ar-Sarnau SAC for their ongoing support of this work. 2025-03-24T09:58:32.8817457 2025-03-24T09:48:21.8716454 Faculty of Science and Engineering School of Biosciences, Geography and Physics - Biosciences Richard Unsworth 0000-0003-0036-9724 1 Sam Rees 2 69141__33863__b1aab6d69436453a9674bd781728e513.pdf 69141.VOR.pdf 2025-03-24T09:55:37.8545924 Output 2845659 application/pdf Version of Record true This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons CC-BY license. true eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
title The road to seagrass restoration at scale using engineering
spellingShingle The road to seagrass restoration at scale using engineering
Richard Unsworth
Sam Rees
title_short The road to seagrass restoration at scale using engineering
title_full The road to seagrass restoration at scale using engineering
title_fullStr The road to seagrass restoration at scale using engineering
title_full_unstemmed The road to seagrass restoration at scale using engineering
title_sort The road to seagrass restoration at scale using engineering
author_id_str_mv b0f33acd13a3ab541cf2aaea27f4fc2f
25809349ff4e207ac37ac3846a87b51c
author_id_fullname_str_mv b0f33acd13a3ab541cf2aaea27f4fc2f_***_Richard Unsworth
25809349ff4e207ac37ac3846a87b51c_***_Sam Rees
author Richard Unsworth
Sam Rees
author2 Richard Unsworth
Sam Rees
format Journal article
container_title Ecological Engineering
container_volume 215
container_start_page 107607
publishDate 2025
institution Swansea University
issn 0925-8574
1872-6992
doi_str_mv 10.1016/j.ecoleng.2025.107607
publisher Elsevier BV
college_str Faculty of Science and Engineering
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hierarchy_top_id facultyofscienceandengineering
hierarchy_top_title Faculty of Science and Engineering
hierarchy_parent_id facultyofscienceandengineering
hierarchy_parent_title Faculty of Science and Engineering
department_str School of Biosciences, Geography and Physics - Biosciences{{{_:::_}}}Faculty of Science and Engineering{{{_:::_}}}School of Biosciences, Geography and Physics - Biosciences
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description Seagrass restoration efforts have been ongoing for decades, with early innovations dating back to the 1970s. While there has been progress, many projects have high failure rates, but the consensus within the literature is that increasing spatial scale will lead to higher success rates. To achieve scaled-up restoration, innovation in the context of mechanised approaches is required that can reduce the costs and labour-intensive processes and improve reliability. This review paper focuses on the restoration of seagrass meadows and how engineering solutions have been used to help scale up these efforts. The paper examines the different stages within seagrass restoration and how mechanised approaches have been used to date, along with their levels of success or failure. Various stages of restoration are examined, from seed collection, separation, storage, planting, and the biological and environmental engineering challenges associated with upscaling these efforts. The review focuses primarily on Zostera species due to its dominance in the literature, but expands to other species where possible. Although extensive mechanised approaches have been used (e.g. seed planting sleds), a common thread through the studies remains the limited underpinning understanding of the biology to improve the use of these methods and a solid understanding of the relative merits of the use of these techniques. Despite innovations, seagrass restoration is still marked by high failure rates. More interdisciplinary work is required to link biological and engineering solutions to environmental variability for greater restoration success.
published_date 2025-05-01T08:21:29Z
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