Convex Seascape Survey

What impact does the ocean have on climate change? It is one of the great unsolved scientific questions of our time. The seascape is the ultimate sink for carbon emissions, and could be an immense ally in efforts to slow runaway climate change. The role of mangroves, seagrass and saltmarsh ecosystems to sequester and store carbon is increasingly recognised. But there is limited understanding of the dynamics of the carbon cycle across the global continental shelves.   

The Convex Seascape Survey is a pioneering global research project, developed in partnership by Blue Marine Foundation (Blue Marine), University of Exeter, and Convex Group Ltd. Now, two years into its five-year lifespan, 100 of the world’s leading experts are investigating, modelling and quantifying carbon storage in vast coastal seas around the globe whose carbon capacity is currently unknown. Their work will generate critical data and insight into how to manage the ocean sustainably to maximise its carbon-storage capabilities.    

The project will deliver new, reliable, open-source data on continental-shelf carbon that will educate, inspire, and enable informed decisions on ocean use. The survey is addressing questions such as: Where are the biggest stores of carbon in shelf seas? How and when did they get there? What role do life and biodiversity play in these stores? And how does past and present human activity affect seascape carbon? And putting all this accurately into global carbon budgets for the very first time.  

In 2024, our scientists used historical data, eDNA analyses and modelling techniques to discover where seabed carbon comes from. We’ve mapped changes in ocean currents over the past 20,000 years to predict carbon hotspots on continental shelves, and completed the first full carbon budget model of the Patagonian shelf to help researchers understand the carbon exchange between the atmosphere, land, and ocean on continental shelves. Elsewhere, a fieldwork team in Jersey processed more than sixty seafloor core samples in a pop-up quayside laboratory to discover the composition of carbon in the seabed. 

Our intrepid colleagues battled strong weather and tides to gather comparative data from protected vs unprotected seabed in Jersey and New Zealand’s Hauraki Gulf. This data helps us to understand how activities like trawling affect biodiversity and carbon stores, and how quickly these ecosystems recover from disturbance. We’ll be comparing the findings to previous data from Arran and will replicate this study at other sites in 2025. 2024 saw a return to Millport, Scotland, to run a second series of bioturbation experiments, looking at the important role of tiny seabed creatures like worms and shellfish in burying carbon in the mud.

Alongside scientific research, the project is delivering a programme of communication and education to raise awareness of how ocean health is linked to the climate. A key aim is to engage young people, the public, governments and decision-makers with the value of ocean carbon and the urgent need to protect it to limit global temperature rises. Gathering accurate data to quantify the extent to which healthy seascapes thriving with life can absorb carbon has never been more crucial. 

Our work was highlighted in the Guardian, Forbes and The Sunday Times, at the World Ocean Summit and the UN in Barcelona and New York. Artworks by Chris Levine and Naomi Hart inspired the public to embrace the benthic zone and mud-dwelling creatures, and our education programme reached almost 500,000 students, with 15,000 viewers tuning in for live lessons broadcast during British Science Week and COP 29. 

Explore the Convex Seascape Survey website.

Find out more about the project by clicking here.