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Beach cleaning resumes on the Mar Menor
Algae and sludge will be removed from four Cartagena beaches
The Scientific Advisory Committee of the Mar Menor gave the green light this week for several specialised teams to begin removing the unsightly sludge from four Cartagena beaches: Punta Brava, Los Urrutias, Estrella de Mar and Los Nietos. The overall clean-up project has been given a budget of more than one million euros.
This was announced by the Minister of the Environment, Juan María Vázquez, who explained that this pilot project is being based on "the most effective available techniques that can be applicable to the Mar Menor case, and defines the actions for the recovery and maintenance of the selected beaches."
As well as removing the sludge in the worst affected areas, the team of experts plans to study the long-term impact on the natural environment of clearing this algae before it decomposes.
"The recovery of the Mar Menor is a priority objective for the regional government, shared by civil society. Scientific advice and support is important to select and execute actions aimed at improving the ecological state of the Mar Menor, while promoting scientific knowledge and applied research in relation to environmental problems,” Mr Vázquez added.
But taking things even further, the Spanish Institute of Oceanography is working on developing a new algorithm that will allow them to evaluate the concentration of chlorophyll in the water through the satellite images from space.
This celestial monitoring will inform the experts on how phytoplankton grows and will evaluate and analyse the state of the Mar Menor during the coming decades.
In other news: Medications and cosmetics pose a new threat to the Mar Menor
Image: Ayuntamiento de Cartagena
