Coral Restoration Short Movie
We are more than excited to announce the release of our brand new short film about the first-of-its-kind coral restoration study, here at Fregate Island.
The short film on our experimental coral restoration initiative was another successful collaboration of Fregate Island, Blancpain Ocean Commitment and Coralive.org. The project is part of our long-standing Ocean Commitment program to restore and preserve the marine environment in the Seychelles.
As the situation of corals continues to be challenging, the teams have found a way to take coral restoration to the next level. The key factors in doing so are scalability, efficient logistics, sustainable energy production and usage. They decided to launch a research project (first of its kind) to study the positive effects of Mineral Accretion Technology (MAT) – a trailblazing method that results in higher survival rates of coral fragments compared to classic rehabilitation. The film showcases the team’s mission in supporting the regrowth of corals and resilience using MAT elaborated in phase 1 to understand electrical stimulation of corals during 12hrs (day) vs. 12hrs (night) vs. 24hrs vs. a control setup.
After the first stage of the project being very successful, the project is now in phase two. The motivation behind the study is to understand scalability, which will be the key factor in future coral restoration efforts, making the firsthand results in this research and experience of the utmost importance. Whether it’s placing different structures easily and fast or keeping the costs as low as possible through exact planning and calculations, producing the electricity on land or through floating solar panels, the team will be able to observe the differences in growth speed and survival rates of corals when they are stimulated under different scenarios.
Since 2018, Fregate Island, Blancpain and Coralive.org have joined forces to study, restore and preserve the marine environment around the island. Coralive.org and BlueNomads.org led the field projects with additional support from the Green Islands Foundation, and the Seychelles Conservation and Climate Adaptation Trust.
