Carbon Storage in Intertidal Environments (C-SIDE)

地球气候正在变暖，地球仪周围的海平面正在上升，淹没和侵蚀我们的海岸。盐沼是一种面临危险的重要沿海环境。这些是植被覆盖的滩涂，隐藏在避风的海湾中，陆地和海洋之间有一个逐渐的过渡。它们也出现在更暴露的地方，在那里它们形成了抵御海水侵蚀的天然屏障。盐沼也很有价值，因为生长在盐沼上的植物吸收碳的速度非常快，比树木快得多。因此，盐沼在吸收大气中的碳并将其储存起来方面很有用。由于大气中的碳在控制地球温度方面很重要，因此将碳储存在地下有助于减缓气候变化。盐沼上的植被接近最高潮汐的水平。每次涨潮时，盐沼表面都会沉积一层薄薄的泥。随着时间的推移，盐沼泥变得越来越厚，但只有当海平面上升时，它才会增加厚度。因此，从这个意义上说，海平面上升对盐沼是有利的，因为如果泥的数量变得更厚，它们可能会储存更多的碳，进一步减少气候变化！这是一个新的想法。这是否是真的是我们想知道的。一如既往，事情并不那么简单。除了海平面上升之外，还有其他因素可以在改变盐沼中埋藏的碳量方面发挥作用，例如潮汐，沉积物的可用性，植物的类型以及沼泽是否被遮蔽或暴露于海洋。我们选择了英国的7个沿海地区，它们都略有不同，以分析这些不同的因素。海平面上升，我们认为是最重要的部分，在南部要快得多，那里的海岸正在下沉，相比之下，苏格兰的陆地上升得非常轻微。我们可以把英国当作一个“天然实验室”来回答全球性的问题：是什么控制了盐沼的碳吸收？海平面上升有益吗？我们期望我们的研究能为世界各地的盐沼提供教训。我们会做什么？我们把我们的项目分成五个部分。在第一部分中，我们将看看过去和现在的盐沼泥。我们将通过取芯和运行可以“看到”地下的设备来测量泥浆的厚度。我们将在7个地点中的每个地点收集4个岩心，并使用放射性测年方法来告诉我们这些沉积物的年龄。这一点很重要，因为海平面的变化随着时间的推移而变化，而且在过去100年中上升的速度比以前快得多。我们还将测量今天泥浆的堆积情况。在第2部分中，我们将测量有多少碳储存在地上和地下。我们将调查沼泽地上生长的植物，然后在实验室里进一步测量。我们将测量我们收集的核心中的碳含量，并进行分析，以找出碳来自何处（来自沼泽植被本身或随潮汐冲刷）。用埋在地下的茶包进行实验，将使我们能够找出在埋葬过程中死去的植物损失了多少碳。我们将招募公众成员来帮助我们取样，这样我们就可以覆盖更多的盐沼。我们有一个应用程序。在第3部分和第4部分中，我们将从各种来源收集数据，并将我们的7个站点的数据相乘，以了解我们的调查结果对整个英国的代表性。所有的盐沼都将被绘制成三维地图。我们将收集所有环境因素的数据，并找出哪些可以预测有多少碳在盐沼使用统计和计算机模型。第五部分是关于这个项目的好处。我们将利用我们的研究结果来建议海岸线的管理者如何利用盐沼来帮助应对气候变化和海平面上升，例如在旧的沿海农田上建立新的盐沼。

The Earth's climate is warming and sea levels are rising around the globe, flooding and eroding our coasts. One important type of coastal environment that is at risk are saltmarshes. These are vegetated tidal flats that are tucked away in sheltered embayments, where there is a gradual transition between the land and sea. They also occur in more exposed locations where they form a natural defence against the encroaching sea. Saltmarshes are also valuable because the plants that grow on them absorb carbon at a very fast pace, much faster than, for example, trees. Saltmarshes are therefore useful in taking carbon out of the atmosphere and storing it away. Because carbon in the atmosphere is important in controlling the Earth's temperature, storing carbon in the ground can help reduce climate change.The vegetation on a saltmarsh is close to the level of the highest tides. Every time the tide comes in, a thin layer of mud is deposited on top of the saltmarsh surface. Over time, the saltmarsh mud gets thicker, but it can only increase in thickness if sea level goes up. So in that sense, sea-level rise can be beneficial to saltmarshes, because if the amount of mud gets thicker they can perhaps store more carbon and reduce climate change further! It is a new idea. Whether it is actually true is what we want to find out.As always, things aren't so simple. Apart from sea-level rise, there are other factors that can play a role in changing the amount of carbon buried in a saltmarsh, for example the tides, the availability of sediment, the types of plants, and whether the marsh is sheltered or exposed to the sea. We have picked 7 coastal regions in Britain that are all slightly different to analyse these different factors. Sea-level rise, the part we think is most important, is much faster in the south, where coasts are sinking, compared to Scotland, where the land is going up ever so slightly. We can treat Britain as a 'natural laboratory' to answer global questions: What controls carbon uptake in saltmarshes? Is sea-level rise beneficial? We expect that our studies will teach us lessons for saltmarshes around the world.What will we do? We have designed our project into five parts. In part 1 we will look at the salt marsh mud in the past and present. We will measure how thick the mud is by coring and by running equipment which can 'see' below the ground. We will collect four cores at each of the 7 sites and use radioactive dating methods to tell us how old these sediments are. This is important because sea-level change has varied through time and rose much faster in the last 100 years than before. We will also measure the build-up of mud in the present day. In part 2 we will measure how much carbon is stored both above and below the ground. We will survey the plants which are growing on the marsh and then measure them further in the laboratory. We will measure the amount of carbon in the cores we collected, and do analyses to find out where the carbon came from (from the marsh vegetation itself or washed in with the tide). Experiments with buried tea bags will allow us to find out how much carbon is lost from dead plants during burial. And we will recruit members of the general public to help us with sampling so that we can cover more saltmarshes. We have an app for this. In part 3 and 4 we will gather data from various sources and multiply the data from our 7 sites to find out how representative our findings are for the whole of Britain. All saltmarshes will be mapped in 3 dimensions. We will collect data on all environmental factors and find out which ones can predict how much carbon is in saltmarshes using statistics and computer models. The final part 5 is all about the benefits of this project. We will use our results to recommend how managers of coastlines may be able to make use of saltmarshes to help fight climate change and sea-level rise, for example by establishing new saltmarshes on old coastal farmland.