Coral Relocation as Habitat Mitigation for Impacts from the Barzan Gas Project Pipeline Construction, Offshore Qatar

Abstract

Abstract The Barzan Gas Project is a critical program to deliver natural gas to Qatar’s future industries. This project was expected to cause impacts to shallow coral communities during pipeline construction from Qatar’s North Field to onshore. To partially meet the state’s environmental clearance for the project whilst supporting the state’s national vision, RasGas Company Limited developed a project-specific Coral Management, Relocation, and Monitoring Plan that incorporated proven methodologies to relocate at-risk coral colonies to a suitable location. The coral relocation project includes the following: an initial Benthic Environmental Survey (BES) to assess coral colonies’ health and suitability for relocation;relocation of more than 1,600 corals from the pipeline corridor to a habitat specifically created for the reattachment of the coral colonies due to the lack of available hard bottom substrate containing 550 native quarried limestone boulders; anda five (5) year monitoring program to assess the health of the reattached coral colonies, colonization of the artificial habitat and document reef fish associated with the recipient site. Preliminary monitoring results indicate that the relocated corals were of comparable health and exhibited similar signs of stress as the reference corals. This paper presents monitoring results from Surveys II (January 2013) and III (July 2013) which were assessed for the following categories – reattached colony bonding status, colony health assessment, benthic characterization, reef fish assemblage, sediment accumulation, sea urchin density and water column data. RasGas will continue to monitor and report on the Barzan coral monitoring program as it matures and incorporate lessons learned. This paper has reported on the data from the two 2013 surveys following the post-relocation baseline survey in 2012. Despite the initial challenges to find a suitable substrate, the quarried limestone boulders have proven to be a sustainable habitat for the relocated corals, associated fauna and reef fish populations. The project will hopefully contribute to the body of existing knowledge for building successful coral relocation programs in the Gulf and stand as testament to RasGas’ commitment to protecting Qatar’s precious offshore biodiversity.