Seagrass ecosystems as a globally significant carbon stock pdf

For seagrasses, median above and belowground biomass was 0. Variability in the carbon storage of seagrass habitats and. Seagrass decline releasing large quantities of carbon seagrass is widely distributed in the worlds oceans. We tested the effects of warming on seagrass corg stocks in situ by transplanting seagrass soil cores along a thermal plume generated by a coalfired power plant in a seagrass. When seagrass beds are damaged or destroyed, oxygen reaches the buried material oxydizing the carbon to form carbon dioxide that reenters the atmosphere. Seagrass ecosystems as a globally significant carbon stock by james w. Carbon dioxide co 2 is the main component of greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming.

Seagrass meadows are some of the most productive ecosystems on earth. Seagrass ecosystems contribute to fishery productivity globally, but information about the intricacies of how this productivity is directly exploited from seagrass meadows themselves is lacking. A comparison between organic carbon c org isotope signatures in seagrass sediments with that in bare sediments adjacent to the meadows concluded that the relative contribution of seagrass to the c org stock was similar between seagrass and adjacent bare sediments kennedy et al. Request pdf seagrass ecosystems as a significant global carbon stock the protection of organic carbon stored in forests is considered as an important method for. However, large gaps in knowledge remain, particularly for seagrass meadows in africa. In this prospective we discuss two areas of investigation that require further scrutiny.

This has led to growing interest in the conservation. Biogeosciences 2016 seagrass ecosystems as globally significant carbon stock. Seagrass is a valuable ecosystem that provides varied services in the water and on land. The organic carbon that accumulates in seagrass meadows is derived not only from seagrass production but from the trapping of other particles, as the seagrass canopies facilitate sedimentation and. Carbon stock in seagrass meadows of bintan island, riau archipelago. Blue carbon stocks of great barrier reef deepwater. When interhabitat variation in seagrass organic carbon stocks was ignored and we applied only the p. A more detailed inspection of the data, reveals a close. Estimates suggest that seagrass meadows bury carbon 40 times faster than tropical forests, and provide one of the greatest contributions to the total carbon buried in ocean sediments. An analysis of organic carbon data from just under one thousand seagrass meadows indicates that, globally, these systems could. By jw fourqurean, cm duarte, h kennedy, n marba, marianne holmer, ma mateo, et apostolaki, ga kendrick, d krausejensen, kj mcglathery and o serrano. Duarte2,3, hilary kennedy4, nuria marba2, marianne holmer5, miguel angel mateo6, eugenia t. Blue carbon habitats, accumulating sediments at rates of about 2 to 4 mm year. In lieu of available data, experts provided information about seagrasses and their ecosystem services around indonesia seagrasses and the ecosystem services they support across the indonesian archipelago are in a critical state of decline.

Blue carbon describes the carbon captured by living marine organisms and stored in their ecosystems. Based on the global extent of seagrass meadows 177000 to 600000km2, these ecosystems globally store between 11 and 39 pg of pic in the top metre of sediment and accumulate between 22 and 75tgpicyr1, representing a signi. Duarte1,5,6 1department of global change research imedea csicuib institut mediterrani destudis avanc ats, miquel. Grasses growing at the bottom of our oceans lock away large quantities of blue carbon, according to a new study. Pdf seagrass ecosystems as a globally significant carbon. However, their increasingly high rates of loss and degradation over the last decade have necessitated the development of effective and nondestructive ways to.

Seagrass ecosystems as a globally significant carbon stock, is the first global. Export from seagrass meadows contributes to marine carbon. Seagrass ecosystems are among the most effective carbon sinks on the earth. Using edna to determine the source of organic carbon in. Mcglathery10 and oscar serrano6 the protection of organic carbon stored in. Organic carbon stocks in tidal salt marshes and mangroves have been estimated, but uncertainties in the stores of seagrass meadows. Seagrass meadows represent globally important stores of carbon.

Seagrass meadows provide critical ecosystem services for coastal areas, e. Our results show that they also act as sinks for petroleum hydrocarbons, with burial rates increasing over time. There is considerable interest in quantifying the capacity of the worlds ecosystems to trap and store carbon, as this can. Seagrasses can store as much carbon as forests sciencedaily. The global significance of carbon storage in indonesias coastal wetlands was assessed based on published and unpublished measurements of the organic carbon content of living seagrass and mangrove biomass and soil pools. Of the various estuarine habitats, carbon sequestration rates are least understood in coastal seagrass beds such as are found in the. Seagrass ecosystems as a significant global carbon stock. 39 chapter 3 field sampling of soil carbon pools in coastal ecosystems 67 chapter 4 field sampling of vegetative carbon pools in coastal ecosystems 109 chapter 5 how to estimate carbon dioxide emissions 123 chapter 6 remote sensing and mapping 7 chapter 7 data management 145 appendices 173 references. Carbon storage in the seagrass meadows of gazi bay, kenya. Seagrass meadows are globally important sinks of blue carbon, but warming water temperatures due to climate change may undermine their capacity to sequester and retain organic carbon corg.

Vegetated marine habitats are globally important carbon sinks, making a significant contribution towards mitigating climate change, and they provide a wide range of other ecosystem services. Assessing carbon stock and sequestration of the tropical. In addition, seagrass meadows play a significant role in climate change mitigation though carbon storage within their sediments. Seagrasses store as much carbon as forests live science.

Characterizing blue carbon stocks in thalassia testudinum. Healthy seagrass forms underwater meadows that harbor. Along a persistent gradient in total phosphorus concentrations in the water column and a parallel. About 40 tt co 2 was accumulated in the ocean plays an important role in the oceanss carbon cycle. Shark bay has the largest c stock reported for a seagrass ecosystem globally with up to 1. Accelerated burial of petroleum hydrocarbons in arabian. Seagrass meadows form some of the most productive ecosystems in the world 1. The protection of organic carbon stored in forests is considered as an important method for mitigating climate change. The study seagrass ecosystems as a globally significant carbon stock, published in the journal nature geoscience provides further evidence of the important role the worlds declining seagrass meadows have to play in mitigating climate change. Seagrasses are a vital part of the solution to climate change and can store up to twice as much carbon as the worlds temperate and tropical forests, new research indicates. Whether deepwater seagrasses provide the same important ecosystem services as their shallowwater counterparts has received much interest, especially given recent data demonstrating the potential for shallowwater seagrasses to act as globally significant blue carbon sinks, thereby helping to mitigate climate change 5,6. So report researchers publishing a paper this week in the journal nature geoscience the paper, seagrass ecosystems as a globally significant carbon stock, is the first global analysis of. Seagrass ecosystems likely represent a globally significant carbon stock, with estimates suggesting that 19.

Both c fixation by the seagrass autochthonous and the trapping of organic matter that is derived from outside the ecosystem allochthonous. The amount of c orgstored in living seagrass biomass globally averaged 2. The recent surge in research on organic carbon sequestration by seagrass ecosystems has begun to reveal the complexity of the carbon cycle within these ecosystems. Their role as blue carbon and their capacity to mitigate climate change, by means of natural mechanism of carbon dioxide removal ncdr. An analysis of organic carbon data from just under one thousand seagrass meadows indicates that, globally, these systems could store between 4. Request pdf seagrass ecosystems as a significant global carbon stock the protection of organic carbon stored in forests is considered as an important method for mitigating climate change. The ocean can absorb co 2 through photosynthesis by the planktonic community or coastal vegetations i. Humans have used seagrasses for more than 10,000 years to fertilize fields, insulate houses, weave furniture, thatch roofs, make bandages, and fill mattresses and car seats. Blue carbon refers to carbon dioxide removed from the atmosphere by the worlds coastal ocean ecosystems, mostly mangroves, salt marshes, seagrasses and potentially macroalgae, through plant growth and the accumulation and burial of organic matter in the soil historically the ocean, atmosphere, soil, and terrestrial forest ecosystems have been the largest natural carbon c. However, environmental heterogeneity in shallow, estuarine environments may shape the quantity, composition, and postdepositional processing of organic carbon stocks c org in such meadows. The average carbon stored in kotania bay waters was 2. Losses and recovery of organic carbon from a seagrass. Indonesias globally significant seagrass meadows are.

The present study estimated biomass and sediment organic carbon corg stocks of four dominant. Seagrasses sequester large amounts of blue carboncarbon buried by vegetated marine systemseach year through. Impact of seagrass loss and subsequent revegetation on. Impact of seagrass loss and subsequent revegetation on carbon sequestration and stocks nuria marb a 1, ariane ariasortiz2, pere masque 2,3,4, gary a. Seagrass meadows in indonesia of fundamental importance for biodiversity and ecosystem service provision. Blue carbon stores in tropical seagrass meadows maintained. Seagrass ecosystems as a globally significant carbon stock. Seagrasses sequester globally significant amounts of carbon c, which is stored mainly in the sediment. Indeed, a global estimate of the carbon ate stock in seagrass sediments is not yet available and the potential contribution of these systems to the global ocean carbonate budget remains to be evaluated. Seagrass ecosystems play a vital role in climate change mitigation as they are globally significant carbon sinks and are responsible for 18% of marine carbon sequestration.