An electric reef (also electrified reef) is an artificial reef made from biorock, being limestone that forms rapidly in seawater on a metal structure from dissolved minerals in the presence of a small electric current. The first reefs of this type were created by Wolf Hilbertz and Thomas J. Goreau in the 1980s. By 2011 there were examples in over 20 countries.
History
Artificial reefs have been built since the 1950s using materials including sunken ships, concrete blocks. While artificial reefs have been effective at boosting fish populations and are valuable areas for benthic organisms and other marine life (e.g. sponges) to colonise, they are less viable for coral restoration. due to the slow growth of corals and their susceptibility to environmental changes.
In the 1970s, whilst studying how seashells and reefs grow, Wolf Hilbertz discovered a simple method of creating limestone from minerals dissolved in seawater, which he called biorock. Together with Thomas J. Goreau he realised that this process could be adapted to rapidly create artificial coral reefs during the 1980s. Using the name "Seacrete", the process was publicised in the 1992 futurology book titled The Millennial Project.
With others, Hilbertz and Goreau made expeditions to the Saya de Malha bank in 1997 and 2002 where they grew an artificial island around steel structures anchored to the sea floor using this process. In the Maldives, 80% of the electric reefs survived the 1998 warming which killed 95% of the natural reef corals.
Goreau continued the work after Hilbertz's death in 2007. By 2011 there were electric reef projects installed in over 20 countries. In 2012, both Goreau and Robert K. Trench published works on how the process could generate building materials as well as restore damaged ecosystems.
Construction process
The base of an electrified reef is a welded electrically conductive frame, often made from construction grade rebar or wire mesh which submerged and attached to the seafloor to which an electrical field applied. The frame (cathode) and a much smaller metal plate (anode) placed at a suitable distance from the frame initiates the electrolytic reaction.
Dissolved calcium carbonate and magnesium hydroxide and other minerals naturally found in seawater breakdown in the vicinity of the anode and recombine and precipitate out of the water onto the cathode. The exact composition of the minerals within the crystal formation is depends on their abundance, the climatic conditions and the voltage used. The structure takes on a whitish appearance within days.
This electric field, together with shade and protection offered by the metal/limestone frame soon attracts colonizing marine life, including fish, crabs, clams, octopus, lobster and sea urchins. Once the structure is in place and minerals begin to coat the surface divers transplant coral fragments from other reefs to the frame which soon bond to the newly accreted mineral substrate.
Because of the availability of evolved oxygen at the cathode and the electrochemically facilitated accretion of dissolved ions such as bicarbonate, they start to grow, some three to five times faster than normal and soon the reef takes on the appearance and utility of a natural reef ecosystem.
As shore protection
Shorelines are increasingly susceptible to beach erosion and loss due to climate change which is resulting in rising sea levels and increasingly frequent and more powerful storms. Large structures such as breakwaters constructed to reflect waves to prevent erosion are problematic and can in fact contribute to further beach erosion since for force of waves is doubled due to the reversal of the wave direction vector with the reflected wave carrying sand from the structure's base back out to sea resulting in the structure failing over time.
Common electrified reef used for shore protection mimic the effect of a natural reef which prevent erosion by dissipating wave energy and causing waves to break before they impact the shore. In nature, large reefs, have been shown to dissipate up to 97% of their energy. They are based around the same open mesh frameworks as those used for coral restoration. Skeletons of dead coral and algae from the reef are then deposited and help grow beaches. Because these reefs mimic the properties of natural reefs they solve some of the challenges they have in storm dissipation and their self-healing qualities helps structures survive extreme storms as long as the electricity supply remains in operation.