Climate Change and Great Lakes Wetlands
Wetlands provide more value to humans and nature alike per unit area than any other part of our landscape. They control floods, clean up water polluted by fertilizers and other contaminants, and serve as the best carbon sequestration ecosystems on the planet.
Studies by Dr. William Mitsch and his students at Ohio State’s Olentangy River Wetland Research Park over the past 20 years, as well as his studies at Old Woman Creek National Estuarine Research Reserve in Ohio, the Florida Everglades, the Louisiana Delta, Botswana’s Okavango Delta, and all over the world have illustrated the “how” of wetlands providing important ecosystem services, including those to mitigate climate change. Recent studies have illustrated that methane emissions from most wetlands do not matter because of their ability to sequester carbon at much higher rates.