The Calahonda diving centre is pioneering an activity that both removes refuse from the seabed, as well as recycling lead lying there.

The Chairman of the diving club, Emilio Ortiz, explained that the recovered lead would be used as weights on their diving belts.

Four years ago they began campaigns to clear up the seabed off Calahonda and amongst the general rubbish they recovered 40 kilos of lead. They soon decided to melt it down and to make up the weights for the belt, each individual weight is between a kilo and two kilo.

So how did the lead get down there? Just about all of it comes from fishing, both small pellets of about 20 or 30 gr from angling, and large fishing-net weights.

Lead, of course, is highly toxic and the belt weights used by divers are normally covered in plastic, although using them is much more expensive that simple lead weights.

(News: Calahonda, Costa Tropical, Granada, Andalucia)