2022 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

Mitigating climate change through seaweed aquaculture

Research Project

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Project/Area Number	20H03076
Research Category	Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)
Allocation Type	Single-year Grants
Section	一般
Review Section	Basic Section 40040:Aquatic life science-related
Research Institution	Nagasaki University
Principal Investigator	Nishihara Gregory N. 長崎大学, 海洋未来イノベーション機構, 教授 (40508321)
Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha)	遠藤光鹿児島大学, 農水産獣医学域水産学系, 助教 (00523630) 田中厚子琉球大学, 理学部, 助教 (40509999) 寺田竜太鹿児島大学, 農水産獣医学域水産学系, 教授 (70336329) 佐藤陽一国立研究開発法人理化学研究所, 仁科加速器科学研究センター, 客員研究員 (70361144)
Project Period (FY)	2020-04-01 – 2023-03-31
Keywords	blue carbon / seaweed / macroalgae / climate change / global warming
Outline of Final Research Achievements	Carbon dioxide concentrations are steadily increasing and is leading the increase in global temperatures. In turn, seawater temperature is increasing and changes to the seawater temperatures affect the marine ecosystem. On way to minimize the effect of increasing carbon dioxide concentrations is through mitigation, in other words by removing carbon dioxide. In this study, we assessed the ability of seaweed farms to capture carbon and examined their potential to serve as blue carbon ecosystems. We examined seaweed farms at three sites. One was a mozuku aquaculture farm in Okinawa, and the remaining two were wakame aquaculture farms in Miyagi. We compared these farms to natural ecosystems in Nagasaki. We show that the cultivated species and location of the farms influence the potential of seaweed farms ability to capture carbon, and we show that variations among farms and species were also great. This study has added much insight into how seaweed farms can act as blue carbon ecosystems.
Free Research Field	水圏植物生態学
Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements	炭素隔離は、気候変動緩和のための重要なプロセスである。特に、自然を利用した吸収は、環境保全と食料安全保障を促進するために、魅力的な戦略である。本研究の成果は、海藻養殖場や海藻生態系による炭素隔離の能力を明らかにし、海藻生産と生態系保護への取り組みにつながると期待される。