Why Protecting & Restoring Blue Carbon Ecosystems Matters

Mangroves and seagrass meadows are coastal ecosystems that cover a small portion of the total ocean area but collectively are widely distributed on every continent except Antarctica. Mangroves are fou[...]

Creation of a High Spatio-temporal Resolution Global Database of Continuous Mangrove Forest Cover for the 21st Century

Global mangrove deforestation continues but at a much reduced rate of between 0.16% and 0.39% per year. Southeast Asia is a region of concern with mangrove deforestation rates between 3.58% and 8.08%,[...]

Estimating Global “Blue Carbon” Emissions from Conversion and Degradation of Vegetated Coastal Ecosystems

Recent attention has focused on the high rates of annual carbon sequestration in vegetated coastal ecosystems – marshes, mangroves, and seagrasses – that may be lost with habitat destruction (R[...]

Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) in Coastal Wetlands: A review of their occurrences, toxic effects, and biogeochemical cycling

Coastal wetlands, such as mangroves, seagrass beds, and salt marshes, are highly threatened by increasing anthropic pressures, including chemical pollution. Persistent organic pollutants (POPs) have a[...]

Understanding Blue Carbon

Blue carbon refers to carbon dioxide that is absorbed from the atmosphere and stored in the ocean. “Blue” refers to the watery nature of this storage. The vast majority of blue carbon is carbon di[...]

Researchers Rush to Protect the UK’s Saltmarshes from Sea Level Rise

Saltmarshes sequester significant carbon in their sediment — more per hectare than tropical rainforests. They protect the land from storm surges and sea level rise, and they shelter a variety of bir[...]

A Drop in the Ocean: Closing the gap in ocean climate finance

The ocean is a fundamental economic and environmental engine providing the services that are critical for the success of every economy and the very survival of life on our planet. And yet, it is serio[...]

The Carbon Cycle

Carbon is the basis of all organic substances, from fossil fuels to human cells. On Earth, carbon is continually on the move – cycling through living things, the land, ocean, atmosphere. What happen[...]