Blue carbon is the billion-dollar resource you've never heard of

The Bay of Fundy may soon be known for more than its powerfultides.

Instead, the plants and mud in the coastal ecosystem have the potential to hold hundreds of millions of dollars worth of carbon-offset credits.

Environment and Climate Change Canada is studying how much"blue carbon" is stored along the Bay of Fundy coastline. It hashired a team to measurethe bay'spotential for carbon sequestration.

"Blue carbon" is aterm coined by scientists to describe carbon dioxidestored in coastal plants and soil.

On land, forests capture carbon dioxide andproduce oxygen. Coastal ecosystems do the same but they're much better at it.

Anything trees can do, 'blue' can do better

"Coastal ecosystems can hold three to five times more carbon than the equivalent area of forest," said a federal government document published online in February.

Carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases have been linked to global warming and climate change.

Forestsrelease their carbon every few hundred years, due tofire, tree mortality or human harvesting. Bycomparison, coastal marshes maintain their carbon for thousands of years.

"It just stays there and gets buried," said Gail Chmura, one of North America's foremostexperts in blue carbon research. She is an associate professor in the geography department at McGill University.

She's studying a marsh inDipper Harbour, N.B., that has been soaking up and locking incarbon dioxide for 3,000 years. Many others are even older than that.

Making green off blue carbon

The financial value of blue carbon comes from its potential for carbon emission credits.

The Canadian government is gradually introducing a carbon levy. Various industries will have to pay a fee based on their carbon emissions.

That feewill increase annually until 2022, when itwill be$50 per emitted tonne of carbon dioxide.

On the other hand, if a company removes carbon from the atmosphere, it could generate revenue by sellingoffset credits.

According to government documents, "carbon stored in tidal salt marshes in the Bay of Fundy could have an estimated value of $202 million." That would equal $1 billion in 2022.

It's not clear how blue carbon will fit into the national carbon emissions strategy. It could be used as an offset to meet international targets.

Coastal communities could also be allowed to protect or rehabilitate wetlandsto generate carbon credits.

"So, for example, you take a flight and you feel guilty,you can buy those offset credits," said Chmura. "You could offset your flight.But no one has yet taken advantage of that to restore a salt marsh in Canada."

Officials with Environment and Climate Change Canada declined an interview request until the work to calculate the Bay of Fundy's blue carbon potential is complete. That is expected to be later this year.

Blue carbon recipe: just add water

An experiment that began in 2010 has proven how easy it is to generate blue carbon.

Two sectionsof drained farmland in Aulac, N.B., were allowed to flood. The sectionstotalled approximately the size ofthree CFL-sized football fields.

Scientists,including Chmura, monitored the site to see if vegetation would grow and carbon-rich mud would accumulate.

"Within six years, up to a metre of mud accumulated in that area that was opened up," Chmurasaid. "That's an astounding amount of mud and that mud is very carbon rich."

The newly created marshlandcaptured 2,493 tonnesof carbon, according to a scientific reportpublished inthe online journal PlosOne.That carbon sequestration could be valued at up to $124,650 under Canada's new carbon levy regime.

This type of land is also available for a bargain. The study estimated the marshwould have cost approximately $25,700 to purchase.

While regulations aren't in place for communities to make money on blue carbon projects like these, the Aulacexperiment shows the potential for this type of work.

"You can make money off it,you get all the ecosystem services, you get the habitat that salt marshes have been cherished for, and you get the carbon storage out of the atmosphere,"saidChmura.

"I call ita win-win-win."