Dredging in Coastal Waters

Dredging has been closely linked to coastal developments since about halfway the 19th century when harbours and coastal waterways started to be constructed and dredged to facilitate marine trade and fisheries. The dredging techniques used in excavating shipping channels and harbours (usually to provide and maintain a required water depth) could also be applied in mining aggregates from the sea floor, in putting sub aquatic installations in place, and in land reclamation. Thus dredgers have been employed to provide sand, gravel, mud and mollusc shells for the construction of airfields, artificial islands, coastal defence works as well as to provide mineral ore to the mining industry and building materials like concrete and bricks.The varied use of dredgers has led to the development of a variety of dredger types, from small ones for small-sized inshore projects to very large sea going dredgers for very large projects with storage of the dredged material in the ship. The maximum depth of dredging the seafloor (120-130 m water depth) was reached off Newfoundland (Canada).This book, which is the first book dedicated to dredging and its environmental impact in the widest sense, contains chapters on dredging operations in the Netherlands, Belgium, the UK, Spain, the US, Hong Kong (China) and Singapore. Additional chapters discuss more general aspects such as dredging techniques, monitoring of dredging operations, and the prospects of dredging in a changing environment. Besides information on dredging activities in different areas, it will give insight into the activities and problems (environmental or other) involved in modern dredging.