Surf breaks can help conservation and sequestration: Forests, marshes, and mangroves located near surf breaks — spots in the ocean with underwater obstructions like reefs — play a crucial role in carbon sequestration, Bloomberg reported, citing a study (pdf) published in the Conservation Science and Practice journal. The study reveals that surf ecosystems — which cover 28.5k square kilometers and host 3.6k surf breaks — can hold roughly 1% of annual global energy-related CO2 emissions today, underscoring the importance of protecting those areas to mitigate climate change.

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What exactly are surf ecosystems? Surfing ecosystems are the spaces and interactions between multiple coastal environments where surfing takes place. These include elements like waves, reefs, currents, sediment, flora, fauna, and humans.

The findings: Surf ecosystems store around 88.3 mn metric tons of irretrievable carbon that if lost, cannot be recovered through capture or other methods for 30 years, the study finds. This carbon is primarily stored in mangroves (26.1%), tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests (24.0%), temperate broadleaf and mixed forests (15.5%), temperate conifer forests (9.1%), and Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and scrub (5.0%). However, 20% of this carbon is found in areas crucial for biodiversity but lacking protection.

There can be large benefits to protecting surf break ecosystems: The research focuses on a case study in Indonesia, where local communities, in collaboration with national and international organizations, are developing locally-managed marine areas they call Surf Protected Area Networks, or SPANs. On Indonesia’s Morotai Island, 10 out of 25 significant surf breaks are now within protected areas, safeguarding 60% of the island’s irrecoverable carbon stocks, the report concluded.

What’s next? The results were a rough “first pass” at quantifying the irrecoverable carbon stores next to surf breaks, the paper’s lead author Jacob Bukoski told Bloomberg. On-the-ground research would be needed to measure the actual carbon sequestration around a potential surf-protected area and any threats to those ecosystems, the researcher said, adding that further exploration of surf ecosystems as conservation assets is needed.

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