Barcelona: Why are the city's beaches disappearing?

Barcelona is a place you might have visited, perhaps you have even spent some time enjoying the Spanish city's beaches.

But could they be about to disappear altogether?

The beaches in Barcelona are man-made rather than natural, having been designed 30 years ago when the city was hosting the 1992 Olympic Games.

The city authorities used thousands of tonnes of sand to expand its beach front, because it thought sandy beaches would appeal to tourists.

But over time more than 70% of the sand has disappeared, and if that trend continues there soon won't be any beach left.

Across the Catalonian region of north-eastern Spain, rising sea levels and winter storms have been eating away at the coastline.

In the past 20 years the rate of erosion along Spain's east coast has been speeding up.

Until now the sand has been topped up with fresh sand in spring imported from other areas.

But due to the rate of erosion, the practice of "enhancing" beaches by replacing the sand in this way is now being seen as pointless, a waste of money, and environmentally damaging.

Without it, little by little, the city's beaches could return to the gravelly strips they were before, or disappear completely.

The beaches are estimated to bring in around 60m euros per year, and for nearby coastal towns the beaches are the main draw bringing people to the area.

Overall Catalonia's beaches have lost 25% of their sand since 2015.

When Storm Gloria hit Spain's east coast in Jan 2020 it resulted in much of the sands beaches being washed elsewhere, and less than half of this has been recovered.

The Spanish government has spent millions on Catalonia's coastal defences, building sea walls and breakwaters, but not on replacing sand.

As the practice has been seen as environmentally damaging, the local department for climate action is now proposing that working with nature is a better idea - creating sand dunes, for example.

The solution has been tried elsewhere but hasn't always gone to plan, as creating the dunes in the first place needs even more sand.

Money has been set aside to buy sand to protect the beaches for the tourist season but this approach is seen as too expensive to continue in the long term.