Photo of the day

What’s so exciting and important about blue carbon (ocean habitats and species with the ability to capture and store carbon in vast quantities) is its largely untapped potential to help solve the climate crisis. While the best studied and understood blue carbon ecosystems are mangrove forests, seagrass meadows, and tidal marshes, there are also other emerging blue carbon areas of interest, such as seaweed, phytoplankton, shellfish — including the blue mussels (Mytilus edulis) in today’s photo — seabed sediments, and marine fauna such as whales, invertebrates, and fish found at dark depths of 200 to 1,000 meters (656 to 3,280 feet). These ocean plants, animals, and features are already known to be critical carbon sinks, and there’s still so much more to discover about their capacity to help us save the planet.