(CBS4) DANIA BEACH Nova Southeastern University Oceanographic Center is taking part Wednesday in gathering tire debris from the seafloor and turning it into reuseable energy.

Located within John U. Lloyd Beach State Park in Dania Beach, university researchers explained they are taking part in a full-scale tire salvage and recycling operation aimed at about 700,000 tires lying in the ocean.

The dive sites will take place about a mile off the Fort Lauderdale coast, and tires that are recovered will be brought to Port Everglades each day for recycling.

How did the tires get there? It was a well-intentioned attempt in 1972 to create what was touted as the world's largest artificial reef made of tires. Create new marine habitat and alternative dive sites to relieve pressure on natural reefs, while disposing of tires that were clogging landfills.

But it didn’t work, because sea life hasn’t formed on the tires. And bundles of tires bound together with nylon and steel have broken loose and are scouring the ocean floor. So various agencies viewed it as an ecological problem that needed to be cleaned up.