From The Conversation: Research has suggested healthy whale populations could help us in unexpected ways – by storing carbon for the long term. How? Whales are usually huge. Among their number is the blue whale, the largest animal ever to have lived. At up to 30 metres long and 190 tonnes, they’re bigger than any dinosaur. […]
Researchers have provided a first estimate of the effect of offshore wind farms on sedimentary organic carbon stocks in the Southern North Sea. A new peer-reviewed paper published in Frontiers in Marine Science has provided the first assessment of the net impact of offshore windfarms (OWFs) on sediment organic carbon (OC) stocks over the entire […]
While many efforts to fight climate change have focused on planting trees or restoring wetlands, researchers publishing in Trends in Ecology and Evolution advocate for the importance of understanding the carbon sequestration potential of the planet’s largest animals—whales. In their paper, the researchers explore how whales can influence the amount of carbon in our air and waters […]
The All-Party Parliamentary Group for the Ocean has released “The Ocean: Turning the Tide on Climate Change”, which examines blue carbon and ocean-based solutions to climate change. The report calls for the Government to prioritise and facilitate investment in blue carbon and ocean-based solutions in order to combat climate change, making several key […]
Does biodiversity-focused protection of the seabed deliver carbon benefits? A U.K. case study Researchers have found that by using recent data on UK seabed sediment carbon and mobile bottom fishing, the current UK Marine Protected Area network is likely to offer limited carbon benefit, even if fully protected. Dr Graham Epstein of the University of […]
New research in the journal PLOS Climate has estimated that by eliminating mobile bottom fishing it could reduce seabed carbon disturbance by 27-67%. Below is an extract from the article abstract: ‘Mobile bottom fishing using trawls and dredges may cause significant reductions in seabed sediment organic carbon stores, limiting the oceanic carbon sink. […]
New research on the vulnerability of the UK’s seabed carbon stores to the pressures from bottom trawling by fishing boats could help protect vulnerable shelf seas. Researchers from the University of St Andrews have collaborated with Scottish Government scientists to develop a new predictive approach that will help assess how vulnerable the UK’s seabed […]
Introducing in the latest issue of ECO magazine, the senior editor Kira Coley writes that “the potential of blue carbon goes well beyond the restoration of important coastal habitats and mitigating climate change. If done right, there is also potential to grow economies, improve the livelihoods of local communities and see financial returns for those […]