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Why Value ‘Blue Carbon’?

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Coastal Zones Ecosystem Services

Part of the book series: Studies in Ecological Economics ((SEEC,volume 9))

Abstract

This chapter intends examine the potential of blue carbon storage ecosystem services to contribute to a healthy climate and to support future protection for the coastal and marine habitats. Coastal ecosystems store ‘blue carbon’ but this provision is currently not protected by any international climate agreement or mechanism. Using scenario analysis, the chapter aims to develop a better understanding of the measurement and valuation of carbon stored and sequestered in coastal and marine ecosystems. Case studies of saltmarshes and seagrasses in England and Europe provide the main focus. Two main scenarios are presented. In one scenario, current environmental protection policies continue to be implemented. In a second scenario, a combination of factors (e.g. less environmental protection, more significant climate change impacts and increased marine pollution) lead to large habitat loss. The loss may be sufficient to lead to the functional extinction of some seagrass species, and hence the services they provide. The on-going debate about the definition of stock and flows of ecosystem services both in biophysical and economic terms and their related valuation issues are also explored based on a carbon cycle example.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    EU Allowance (EUA) is a mean price of traded carbon in the European Union emissions trading scheme (EU ETS), which is the first and the largest international system for trading greenhouse gas emission allowances in operation.

  2. 2.

    When attributing a monetary value to an amount of carbon ($tC) or carbon dioxide ($tCO2) respectively, the actual carbon content of carbon dioxide has to be taken into account to ensure the “damage cost” is normalised between the two units of measure. CO2 weights 44 g/mol, of which 12 g/mol is the mass of carbon and 32 g/mol the mass of the two oxygen atoms. Therefore the carbon content (and associated value/damage cost) of carbon dioxide is 12/44 (just over 25 %) of the value of pure carbon, or in reverse the value of 1 t of carbon is 44/12 (approximately 4 times) that of 1 t of carbon dioxide. This implies that the monetary value of the damage cost presented in $tC is equivalent to the damage cost presented in $tCO2.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Environment, Fisheries & Aquaculture Science (CEFAS), Pakefield Road, Lowestoft, Suffolk, NR33 0HT, UK

    Tiziana Luisetti & Lucille Paltriguera

  2. School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK

    R. K. Turner

  3. School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, Norfolk, NR4 7TJ, UK

    Julian Andrews

  4. School of Medical and Applied Sciences, Central Queensland University, Bryan Jordan Drive, 1319, Gladstone, QLD, 4680, Australia

    Emma Jackson

  5. Centre for Social and Economic Research on the Global Environment (CSERGE), School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich Research Park, Norwich, NR4 7TJ, UK

    Maria Giovanna Palmieri

  6. Affiliate of the Centre for Social and Economic Research on the Global Environment (CSERGE), School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich Research Park, Norwich, NR4 7TJ, UK

    Antara Sen

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  1. Tiziana Luisetti
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  2. R. K. Turner
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  3. Julian Andrews
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  4. Emma Jackson
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  5. Maria Giovanna Palmieri
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  7. Lucille Paltriguera
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Correspondence to Tiziana Luisetti .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, United Kingdom

    R. Kerry Turner

  2. Geography and Environment & Centre for Biological Sciences, University of Southampton, Southampton, United Kingdom

    Marije Schaafsma

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Luisetti, T. et al. (2015). Why Value ‘Blue Carbon’?. In: Turner, R., Schaafsma, M. (eds) Coastal Zones Ecosystem Services. Studies in Ecological Economics, vol 9. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-17214-9_10

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