Teal Carbon

About Teal Carbon:

• It refers to carbon stored in non-tidal fresh water wetlands, encompassing carbon sequestered in vegetation, microbial biomass, and dissolved and particulate organic matter.
• These ecosystems are considered to be more effective at carbon capture and storage than terrestrial forest ecosystems, and can store and sequester more carbon than any other type of terrestrial ecosystem.
• The concept of teal carbon is a recent addition to the environmental science pertaining to organic carbon in inland fresh wetlands. 
• It is a colour-based terminology that reflects the classification of the organic carbon based on its functions and location rather than its physical properties.
• At the global level, the storage of teal carbon across the ecosystems is estimated to be 500.21 petagrams of carbon (PgC), which is a unit to measure carbon.
• Major sources of Teal carbon: Peatlands, freshwater swamps, and natural freshwater marshes account for a significant amount of this storage.
• Threats: Though these wetlands play a crucial role in regulating greenhouse gases, they are vulnerable to degradation from pollution, land use changes, water extraction, and landscape modifications.

Q1: What are Peatlands?

Peatlands are terrestrial wetland ecosystems in which waterlogged conditions prevent plant material from fully decomposing. Consequently, the production of organic matter exceeds its decomposition, which results in a net accumulation of peat.

Source: India’s first ‘teal carbon’ study bets on wetlands to address the challenges of climate adaptation and resilience