Abstract
Seagrass meadows provide multiple ecosystem services, yet they are among the most threatened ecosystems on earth. Because of their role as carbon sinks, protection and restoration of seagrass meadows contribute to climate change mitigation. Blue Carbon strategies aim to enhance CO2 sequestration and avoid greenhouse gasses emissions through the management of coastal vegetated ecosystems, including seagrass meadows. The implementation of Blue Carbon strategies requires a good understanding of the habitat characteristics that influence Corg sequestration. Here, we review the existing knowledge on Blue Carbon research in seagrass meadows to identify the key habitat characteristics that influence Corg sequestration in seagrass meadows, those factors that threaten this function and those with unclear effects. We demonstrate that not all seagrass habitats have the same potential, identify research priorities and describe the implications of the results found for the implementation and development of efficient Blue Carbon strategies based on seagrass meadows.
Keywords
carbon storage, seagrass meadow, blue carbon, climate change, environment
Document Type
Journal Article
Date of Publication
2018
Location of the Work
United Kingdom
Publication Title
Marine Pollution Bulletin
Publisher
Elsevier
School
Centre for Marine Ecosystems Research / School of Science
RAS ID
27696
Funding Information
IM was supported by a grant from Beca Iberoamericana Santander Investigación. OS was supported by an ARC DECRA (DE170101524). JS and JC thank the Vicerrectoría de Investigación, Universidad de Costa Rica (project No. 808-B6-170).
Funding received from the Australian Research Council (ARC)
DE170101524
Administering Institution
Edith Cowan University
First Page
106
Content Type
Full object
Last Page
117
Comments
This is an Authors Accepted Manuscript of: This is an Author's Accepted Manuscript of: Mazarrasa, I., Samper-Villarreal, J., Serrano, O., Lavery, P. S., Lovelock, C. E., Marbà, N., ... & Cortés, J. (2018). Habitat characteristics provide insights of carbon storage in seagrass meadows. Marine pollution bulletin. 134, 106-117. Available here.