What is blue carbon?
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Answer: A. Blue carbon is the carbon captured and stored by oceans and coastal ecosystems such as mangroves, salt marshes and seagrass meadows. These store carbon in plants and sediments.
Watch for: Do not confuse blue carbon (coastal and ocean) with green carbon (land plants and soil).
Why the other options are wrong
- B. Wrong because forest and soil carbon is called green carbon.
- C. Wrong because fossil fuel carbon is not blue carbon.
- D. Wrong because atmospheric carbon is not called blue carbon.
Source to check: UNEP, 'Blue Carbon' report (2009); IUCN website, Blue Carbon
Answer from the official UPSC key. Written and fact-checked by AI against the official key. Spotted a mistake? Report it.