Cleaning up

The coastline of Landes is part of a complex and relatively mobile dune system stretching from the Gironde estuary to the Adour estuary. This system is undoubtedly the largest sand bar in Western Europe.

The entire coastline of the former Aquitaine region is subject to a variety of substantial inputs, either carried by the ocean or left on the beach, whose origins can be summarized as follows: 

• large volumes of wood from the basins of the Bay of Biscay (Garonne, Landes coastal streams, Adour, Nive, etc.)
• “household” waste from various sources (French and Spanish seafronts)
• waste produced by a variety of maritime activities
• waste from fishing activities, which are very important in the Bay of Biscay,
• marine and other animal corpses,
• waste from summer visitors.

The department of Landes and the fifteen coastal communities and EPCIs concerned, as well as the Syndicat Mixte du Littoral Landais, aware of the tourist interest of the coastline and the environmental stakes involved, have therefore been cleaning the entire length of the Landes coastline (106 km between the towns of Biscarrosse and Tarnos) since 1991, using appropriate methods.