Disappearing saltmarsh is essential for carbon capture

The UK has become the first nation to map and estimate the volume of carbon stored in its seabed habitats.

The Blue Carbon Mapping Project suggests that 244 million tonnes of organic carbon are stored in the top 10cm of the UK’s seabeds and coastal habitats like saltmarshes and seagrass beds. 

It’s estimated that every year the seabed and saltmarshes sequester a further 13 million tonnes of carbon, almost three times more than our terrestrial forests. 

A “managed realignment” programme at Abbotts Hall, on the Blackwater Estuary near Colchester in 2002, breached seawalls to create 50 hectares of saltmarsh, but since the mid-1800s 85% of the UK’s saltmarshes have been lost. 

Conservationist Richard Negus, who knows the saltmarshes of Essex well, told Shooting Times: “As a passionate wildfowler and a professional conservationist, I share the belief that our coastal saltings and foreshore deserve greater protection. I am, however, saddened to see the primary reason they are deemed worthyof protection is due to their carbon storage potential. 

“Britain’s wildlife should be our immediate and primary concern in habitat management and protection. It is pointless to posture about net zero if our wildlife is already dead.” 

The Blue Carbon Mapping Project was done by the Scottish Association for Marine Science on behalf of WWF, the Wildlife Trusts and the RSPB.