Carbon sinks are natural systems that suck up and store carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The Earth’s land and oceans absorb about half of all carbon dioxide emissions from human activities.
Coastal ecosystems play a mitigation role against climate change by capturing carbon for their development. Mangroves, seagrass beds and salt marshes store at least ten times more carbon than continental forests.
Sedimentary rocks in the Earth’s crust contain loads of carbon compounds, including the hydrocarbons we use as fossil fuels that leads to excess carbon dioxide in our atmosphere.
A forest is considered a carbon sink if it absorbs more carbon than it releases. Worryingly, the Amazon rainforest is now releasing instead of absorbing carbon dioxide.