What is Biomass Sinking?

In simple terms, biomass sinking involves sinking organic plant materials deep into the ocean, where the carbon they capture while growing is stored for thousands, or even millions, of years.

Fun fact: Nature already sequesters carbon this way, but we have the potential to significantly accelerate the process.

Speed of impact: Rapid

Scalability: Huge

Permanence: Minimum thousands of years, potentially millions

Measurability: TBA

Integrity: High

Efficiency: Medium

Cost: $300 per tonne

Additional Benefits: Land-sourced biomass utilises excess waste materials from other activities. Sea-grown biomass fosters biodiversity during growth and helps remove other chemicals from the oceans.

How Does Biomass Sinking Work?

Biomass sinking leverages and enhances natural processes to remove carbon from the atmosphere at scale.

Plants absorb carbon from the atmosphere through photosynthesis as they grow. When they eventually decompose, this carbon returns to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.

Biomass sinking interrupts this cycle by preventing the release of carbon dioxide and other gases into the atmosphere. By sinking plant materials to the ocean's depths, the carbon is sequestered rather than re-released.

Nature already stores some carbon through this process. When rain falls, it washes organic materials (and their stored carbon) into rivers, which carry them into the ocean. Some of this material sinks to the seabed, where it decomposes much more slowly. Over time, it either becomes part of the ocean floor sediment or is consumed by deep-sea organisms, locking its carbon content away for thousands of years or more.

Biomass sinking is a faster, larger-scale version of this natural process.

Where Does the Biomass Come From?

Currently, two main sources of biomass are used in this method of carbon removal:

1. Excess waste materials from land-grown plants: For example, orchard trimmings or agricultural residues (such as stalks and leaves).

2. Cultivated seaweed grown specifically for carbon capture and sinking.

Advantages of Biomass Sourced from Waste Materials

Agriculture and forestry produce excess waste materials, traditionally either burned, buried, or left to decompose, which releases greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

By collecting and sinking this excess waste, we capture and lock away the greenhouse gases that would otherwise contribute to climate change, storing them at the ocean’s depths for thousands of years.

Advantages of Biomass Grown in the Sea

Seaweeds are some of the fastest-growing organisms on Earth. Growing and sinking them in the ocean enables rapid carbon capture and storage.

Seaweeds are incredibly efficient at capturing carbon. For example, kelp forests can remove up to three times more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere per unit area than pine forests.

As they’re already in the ocean, transporting them to deep-sea locations is simpler than with land-grown biomass.

Why Biomass Sinking Is an Ideal Solution for Glad

At Glad, we favour biomass sinking for two main reasons:

1. Speed of Impact

Biomass sinking can deliver meaningful results quickly. By using land-based materials, we lock away already-captured carbon, achieving carbon sequestration in a fraction of the time it would take with tree planting or similar initiatives.

With sea-based materials, the rapid growth of seaweeds means they capture and store carbon more quickly than many terrestrial plants, promising faster carbon removal compared to other methods.

2. Utilisation of Waste Materials

Using biomass grown on land allows us to repurpose waste material that would otherwise be discarded, further reducing environmental impact by transforming potential emissions into long-term carbon storage.

Biomass Sinking: A Key Method in Glad's Portfolio of Carbon Removal Solutions

At Glad, we recognise that fixing climate change requires a blend of effective, scalable solutions, that we can ideally deploy sooner rather than later. Biomass sinking is one such solutions.

By accelerating nature’s own processes, it offers rapid, long-term carbon storage while providing additional environmental benefits, such as promoting biodiversity and reusing waste.

Biomass sinking is just one of the fast, scalable carbon removal methods we support. Our blended portfolio is designed to give customers a diversified approach to carbon removal, balancing speed of impact, cost, and risk.

If you’d like to learn more about how we can help you de-risk your carbon offsetting purchases and efforts to reach net zero, get in touch.