Technology requirements, and social impacts of technology for at-scale coral reef restoration

Abstract

The coral reefs of the world are in decline as a result of local and global stressors. Significant impacts are caused by ocean heat waves associated with increasing ocean temperatures as the oceans accommodate more and more of the heat produced as a result of the global emissions of greenhouse gases. In response, a global reef restoration sector is emerging with the aspiration to restore many of the worlds' reefs and increase their resilience to climate change and other stressors. However, the scale of the challenge is vast, and will realistically only be achieved through the development and application of new marine technology including for environmental surveillance and monitoring, material transfer (corals and coral rubble), new more resilient varieties of corals and the underpinning required data analytics. In addition, most reefs are located in low-income nations, including Small Island Nations and the level of complexity and ease of use of technologies being developed will dictate who can participate in at-scale restoration of the world's reefs, and correspondingly may lead to considerable social distributional impacts as some communities will be able to utilise emerging technologies whilst others may not.