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They posses another advantage, too. Unlike forests on land, blue-carbon ecosystems do not burn. Climate change is intensifying wildfires around the world. As forests burn, their carbon stocks are released back into the atmosphere. And fires can impede a forest's ability to capture carbon even after they have burned out. In a study published on February 25th in Nature Ecology and Evolution, researchers at the University of Stanford found that repeated fires favour slow-growing tree species. These are better able to survive blazes, but they are also less effective at soaking up cartbon than faster-growing species.
他們還有另一個優勢。與陸地上的森林不同，藍碳生態系統不會燃燒。氣候變化正在加劇世界各地的野火。當森林燃燒時，它們的碳儲存被釋放回大氣中。火災會阻礙森林捕獲碳的能力，即便它們已經燃燒殆盡。在2月25日發表在《自然生態與進化》雜志上的一項研究中，斯坦福大學的研究人員發現，火災的經常爆發對生長緩慢的樹種有利。它們在火災中的存活能力更強，但它們吸收碳的效率也不如生長速度較快的物種。
Submerged forests may be impervious to fires, but they remain vulnerable to other sorts of disasters. In May 2020 cyclone Amphan destroyed 1,200 square kilometres of mangrove forest on the border between Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal. A marine heatwave in Australian waters in 2010 and 2011 damaged around one third of the world's largest seagrass meadow, in Shark Bay. Over the next three years field studies showed that uprooted plants were releasing their carbon back into the atmosphere.
水下森林可能不受洪水的影響，但它們仍易受到其他災害的影響。2020年5月，氣旋“安芬”摧毀了孟加拉國和印度西孟加拉邦邊境1200平方公里的紅樹林。2010年和2011年，澳大利亞水域的海洋熱浪破壞了鯊魚灣世界上最大的海草牧場的三分之一。實地研究表明，接下來的三年里被連根拔起的植物正在向大氣中釋放碳。
Fortunately, an older, man-made ecological disaster suggests that restoring damaged blue-carbon ecosystems is possible. During the Vietnam war, napalm and a cocktail of weaponised herbicides destroyed more than half of the mangroves in the Mekong delta. A report published in 2014 by the International Society for Mangrove Ecosystems showed that an intense post-war replanting programme was able to restore it within two decades.
幸運的是，一場更古早的人為生態災難表明，受損的藍碳生態系統的修復是可行的。越南戰爭期間，凝固汽油彈和武器化除草劑破壞了湄公河三角洲一半以上的紅樹林。國際紅樹林生態系統協會2014年發布的一份報告顯示，戰后大規模的重新種植計劃能夠在20年內恢復紅樹林。
And there is more to such ecosystems than simply acting as sponges for greenhouse gasses. They also serve as buffers for vulnerable shorelines, shielding them from storms that barrel in from the high seas. One study of 59 subtropical countries estimated that by dampening waves and providing natural barriers to storm surges, mangrove forests prevent more than $65bn in property damage each year, and help shelter more than 15 million people. Protecting and expanding them, then, appears to be a no-brainer.
這樣的生態系統不僅僅能夠充當溫室氣體的海綿。它們還可以增強脆弱的海岸線，保護它們免受來自公海的風暴的侵襲。一項針對59個亞熱帶國家的研究估計，紅樹林通過抑制海浪和為風暴潮提供天然屏障，每年可防止超過650億美元的財產損失并為1500多萬人提供了庇護。因此，保護紅樹林、擴大紅樹林的面積是無需質疑的舉措。
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