#NOALPUERTODEFONSALÍA

Plataforma Ciudadana Salvar Fonsalía

Ayúdanos a conservar el Suroeste de Tenerife y su inmensa biodiversidad

El Suroeste de Tenerife

Las aguas del Suroeste de Tenerife albergan una gran diversidad marina así como una de las mayores riquezas de cetáceos del territorio europeo, con 26 especies distintas de delfines y ballenas residentes o migratorios, tortugas verdes y tortugas bobas, aves marinas protegidas, praderas submarinas, tiburones y calamares gigantes entre muchas otras, formando una gran explosión de vida. 

Todo este ecosistema está, a su vez, protegido casi en su totalidad por leyes europeas y nacionales, siendo una Zona de Especial Conservación (ZEC) de la Red Natura 2000 eurpea.

Firma la petición

Súmate a nosotros y a otras más de 420.000 personas

Esta petición, de la mano de Ecologistas en Acción y gracias a WeMoveEU, busca llegar a las 50.000 firmas para poder presentar nuestro descontento ante la Unión Europea y detener este proyecto.

https://you.wemove.eu/campaigns/actua-por-hope-deten-nuevo-macropuerto-en-tenerife

¿Cómo ayudar?

Toda acción cuenta

¡Hay muchas maneras de participar! Compartir en redes todo lo que puedas sobre la problemática, firmar la petición, donar en el crowdfunding o ir al apartado que encontrarás justo debajo y copiando y pegando el texto en tu email, para enviarlo a la dirección del Ministerio para la Transción Ecológica: buzon-dgcua@mapama.es

¡Toda acción cuenta!

ENGLISH

There are many ways to participate! Share on networks everything you can about the problem, sign the petition, donate to the crowdfunding or go to the section that you will find below and copy and paste the text in your email, to send it to the address of the spanish's Ministry for Ecological Transition: buzon-dgcua@mapama.es

 Every action counts!

Entidades colaboradoras

¡Juntos podemos detenerlo!

Aquí se presentan los logos de todas aquellas organizaciones que luchan a nuestro lado y/o están en contra de la construcción del puerto de Fonsalía

Logo diseñado por Natalia Corella @la_xylocopa

THE MAIL

NO AL PUERTO DE FONSALÍA

This mail’s main aim is to summarise the numerous and devastating impacts that the construction of the harbour of Fonsalía in the Southwest of Tenerife, in the Canary Islands, would have on protected species and habitats within the Special Areas of Conservation (SACs) ES7020017 “Marine Strip Teno-Rasca” and ES7020117 Marine cave of San Juan. The construction of the harbour of Fonsalía is planned at an area which was excluded from the designation of the SAC Teno-Rasca without environmental reasons. The construction of the harbour would overlap directly with the critical area of green turtle (Chelonia mydas), which is entitled as “endangered” by IUCN, priority species for Directive Habitats), as well as other protected animals and habitats occurring at the surrounding SAC, in many cases within the planned harbour area. Some of these are: Loggerhead turtle (Caretta caretta) (priority species for Directive Habitats), bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus) and sandbanks permanently covered by sea water (which based the declaration of the SAC). Other protected species include the largest population of shortfin pilot whales (Globicephala macrorhynchus) known in European waters, other 20 species of cetaceans, sharks, rays, marine invertebrates and marine birds.

The most relevant impacts of the construction of the harbour would be:

I) The direct destruction of the green turtle habitat. This impact would be devastating as the area where the harbour is planned to be constructed happens to be one of the main zones in the Canary Islands where the juveniles of this species concentrate in order to feed and grow. Currently, this species is already in a difficult situation in the SAC: it is usual to find individuals in very bad conditions due to bycatch or interactions with fishing gear (38% of the cases) and to boat-strikes (33%). There is also a great pressure over them caused by the harassment from divers and supplemental feeding. More stress than they are already suffering would be devastating for the population, and the same applies for the Loggerhead turtle, vulnerable by the IUCN.

II) The rise of marine traffic: the harbour would increase in some 50% the capacity for large ships and smaller waterchaft within the SAC Teno-Rasca. Marine traffic is already causing ship strikes of turtles and whales within the SAC area. Further, excessive pressure by professional and recreational whale watching vessels has been related with high stress hormones on pilot whales at this SAC, underlying the need to limit, not to expand, marine traffic. The population of shortfinned pilot whales in this area is one of the 4 only resident ones known in the world, the other 3 being at Hawaii, California and Florida. It is already usual to encounter whales and turtles stranded on the beach, dead because of boat-strikes, but the population of shortfin pilot whales are in an even more critical situation. They, as a species, are usually found at deep waters (around 1000m). They live primarily in front of Los Cristianos and Puerto Colón, but also in front of Fonsalía, where the precipice reaches a depth of 1000 meters in the first 3 km. The SAC is the furthest area from the other harbours, and it has been a refuge for them for many years. 

This harbour endangers at least 74 protected species, within them 24 cetacean species. These SAC areas have been a little but constant refuge for them, and the sudden increase of traffic would translate in a massive increase of whales and turtle’s strikes with boats. If we add this to the noise and chemical pollution the consequences can be dramatic. In summary, more traffic would result on a major stress for these species, which would become more and more elusive, what would result on a significative decrease on ecotourism and the whale-watching commerce. We need to decrease the traffic, not to increase it. 

III) Increased light pollution would impact negatively on marine turtles and at least on 5 species of nesting seabirds included in Annex I of the Birds directive. These birds are: Common tern (Sterna hirundo), Western osprey (Pandion haliaetus), Macaronesian shearwater (Puffinus [Iherminierii] baroli), Cory’s shearwater (Calonectris borealis) and Bulwer’s petrel (Bulweria bulwerii). Both Cory’s sherwater and common tern nest at the coast of the area of Fonsalía excluded from the SAC, and also in neighbouring areas at the SAC. All of these would be seriously impacted for by light pollution, mainly juveniles but also adults. In juveniles, light can be so disorienting that they end up fledging, resulting in massive groundings. 

IV) Chemical pollution inherent to a harbour and sediment plumes from the construction of seawalls, harbour platforms and accompanying artificial beaches would likely decrease water quality and affect biological communities at the reefs and sand habitats, including seagrass meadows at the SAC.

V) Introduction of alien species: harbours are the main focal points from which invasive species expand into the marine ecosystem. Alien species are one of the main causes of local marine biodiversity loss worldwide.

VI) Economic impacts on nature-based tourism, considering that whale-watching is the second touristic activity at Tenerife. This activity is focused mainly on pilot whales and bottlenose dolphins. Scientific data strongly suggest that the current levels of whales and dolphin watching have exceed the carrying capacity of the cetacean populations at the SAC. In addition, the current saturation of boats decreases the economic value of the whale-wathcing resource. The three principles of the EU Strategy of Blue Growth are equitabiliy, sustainability and intelligence. The later means considering local strengths to advance economic activities. The SAC Tecno-Rasca holds a resource highly singular in European waters: nautical tourism year-round, mostly dependent on a good conservation status of the target observation species. We propose that constructing a fifth harbour within 25 km of coastline of the SAC Teno-Rasca, thus inherently increasing pressure on marine species at the area, is not consistent with the principles of Blue Growth, nor with the Habitats Directive. According to this Directive, activities affecting the good conservation status of priority species at SACs may only be allowed for projects classified as of general interest. While it might be argued by the promoters of the harbour of Fonsalía that this infrastructure is of general interest for Tenerife, we cannot agree, given that there are alternatives with higher environmental and economic value. Further, we recall the recent construction of the harbour Granadilla, some 20 km from the SAC Teno-Rasca. This harbour was approved by DG Environment in spite of the negative environmental impact on SAC ES7020116 “Seagrass meadows South of Tenerife”, habitat of marine turtles, because the harbour was declared of general interest. The harbour of Granadilla is still underutilised and its construction is currently under judicial investigations as a potential case of corruption. 

Considering all this, we propose these solutions, among other options:

1. Intelligent scheduling of ferry timelines to avoid overlap. These feries are run by two companies (Fred Olsen and Armas). A daily shifting schedule for these companies would guarantee intercompany equitability in the allocation of the most demanded timetables by passengers.
2. Engineering a direct link from the harbour traffic to the main road, thus avoiding within-town traffic.

The environmental impacts that would be caused by the construction of the harbour have raised societal concern, resulting on a national movement against this project, with the international support form wemoveEU, SeaLegacy and now Sea Shepherd Global. And, of course, all of the people that are sending this mail to the competent entity. 

Thanks for reading us and for taking into consideration our proposal of NOT building the Fonsalía harbour,

This mail is a summary made by Taïme Smit Pellure from a report named "Canarian SACs in danger. Impacts of Fonsalia harbour project".

And special thanks to Felipe Ravina and all his invaluable help, Maike Bain, Laura Sánchez, Marta Caparrós and Erik Corellà.

For more information about this petition, or in order to get the former report, you can contact us at salvarfonsalia@gmail.com

Envía el mail

E-mail: buzon-dgcua@mapama.es

Dirección: Plaza de San Juan de la Cruz, s/n, 28003 Madrid

Web creada por Taïme Smit Pellure

Ayúdanos a preservar nuestra biodiversidad