观点气候变化

Turning whales into carbon-based assets won’t be easy

We have allowed the natural capital on which we all depend to be depreciated off the books

The writer is a science commentator

Whale poo is like environmental gold dust. It is rich in iron, phosphorus and nitrogen, among the nutrients that phytoplankton, the algae at the bottom of the marine food chain, need to grow.

Phytoplankton produces more than half of the world’s oxygen and sucks as much carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere as four Amazon rainforests. More whales equals more