CARSAFE

The shelves, fjords and estuaries of the subarctic have stored carbon for thousands of years, accumulating organic matter in seafloor sediments. CARSAFE will investigate the likely effects of climate change on these ecosystems, analysing sediment cores from sites across Scandinavia and eastern Canada to reconstruct how carbon burial rates have shifted over the last century. The project will produce the first standardised blue carbon burial rate records from the eastern Canadian margin and selected fjords in Labrador, Canada, and Norway. It will also examine related processes, including pelagic fluxes (which transport carbon across ecosystems), organic matter oxidation (which releases CO₂ and consumes oxygen), and hypoxia (oxygen-deprived conditions that harm marine life), as well as the resilience of the seafloor ecosystem under natural and anthropogenic pressures.  

Recognising the importance of these findings for communities living on subarctic coastlines, CARSAFE will make results publicly available through an open-access Subarctic Blue Carbon Dashboard for scientists, policymakers and coastal communities.