Murray Fisher and Pete Malinowski created the Billion Oyster Project in 2014 to restore oysters to New York Harbor. These oysters offer many ecosystem services; they can help decontaminate waters of certain pollutants, act as storm-surge barriers, and contribute to biodiversity as a keystone species. To date (*), the Billion Oyster Project claims to have restored ~75 million live oysters.

(*) website last accessed 31 January 2022, 7:45pm EST

On their website, they write:

Did you know that New York Harbor was once home to 220,000 acres of oyster reefs? Or, that an adult oyster can filter up to 50 gallons of water a day? The historic evidence of oysters in New York Harbor, combined with the oyster’s reputation as an “ecosystem engineer”, drives us to return New York Harbor to its rightful place as an ecological treasure. Here’s why we need them:

Like coral reefs, oyster reefs provide 3D habitat for hundreds of species. Oysters grow off of one another — creating a hardy infrastructure for a lively underwater city of marine wildlife. Reefs are to the ocean what trees are to the forest.

Oysters filter water as they eat, which helps clarify the water and remove certain pollutants, including nitrogen. This is very important to a marine ecosystem, because excessive nitrogen triggers algal blooms that deplete the water of oxygen and create “dead zones.”

Massive oyster reef systems in New York Harbor were once a natural defense against storm damage—softening the blow of large waves, reducing flooding, and preventing erosion.

Today, the Governor's Office of Storm Recovery (GOSR) is implementing coastal green infrastructure through the Living Breakwaters Project to mimic the reef systems that once existed off of southern Staten Island. Billion Oyster Project will install oysters on and around the infrastructure designed by SCAPE Landscape Architecture.

The Billion Oyster Project aims to meet its goal of 1 billion oysters in the harbor by 2035. In the coming years, they expect an increase in their oyster restoration capabilities.

We are currently piloting oyster setting processes that will allow us to scale to 25 million oysters per field season by 2024.