Biography

Dr. Ariane Arias-Ortiz is an Assistant Professor in the Physics Department at Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona (UAB). She holds a MSc in Oceanography and Marine Environmental Management from the University of Barcelona and a PhD in Environmental Science and Technology from UAB. She completed her postdoctoral research at the University of California, Berkeley, as a NOAA Climate and Global Change Postdoctoral Fellow. Ariane is interested in carbon biogeochemical cycling, ecosystem-atmosphere interactions, and the use of isotopic tracers in environmental materials to study present, past, and future processes. Her work focuses on understanding the capacity of coastal ecosystems to store carbon and the carbon losses associated with the degradation of these habitats. Ariane and her team combine micrometeorological measurements with the analysis of isotopes in soils and water to study carbon and energy flows between coastal ecosystems, the atmosphere, and adjacent water bodies, providing insights into how these fluxes respond to disturbance, land management, and a changing climate.

Abstract

Support for coastal wetland restoration projects that consider carbon storage as a climate mitigation benefit is growing as coastal wetlands are sites of substantial carbon sequestration. However, the climate footprint of wetland restoration remains controversial as wetlands can also be large sources of methane. This talk focuses on the carbon flows into and out of three restored wetlands in California that differ in salinity, tidal influence, and landscape configuration. By understanding the balance between carbon burial, carbon emissions and hydrologic carbon export in various restored wetlands we can provide insights into the benefits and tradeoffs of coastal wetland restoration for climate change mitigation, and perhaps, advise how to optimally design wetland restoration projects to maximize carbon uptake and minimize greenhouse gas emissions.