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We're living in a time where the pace and
dimensions of environmental change are faster

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than any other time in human history.

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More than half the population in the world
lives within 100 miles of the coast and even

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more depend on coastal resources.

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Healthy and resilient coastal ecosystems protect
coastal communities from sea level rise and

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storms.

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Coastal ecosystems including seagrasses are
being lost at increasing rates.

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And they're very important in taking carbon
dioxide out of the atmosphere.

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One of the exciting things about the work
that we're doing in Virginia, is that we're

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reversing that trend.

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Working with partners we now have the world's
largest seagrass restoration program.

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One of the challenges that we've had is that
we weren't able to make measurements out in

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the field, we used to have to take a piece
of the seafloor and bring it back to our lab.

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One of the researchers that works on our program
is Peter Berg, and he's developed a new technology

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using new sensors to put numbers on carbon
sequestration.

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We need to be able to measure success.

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There are two variables we are measuring,
the velocity and we measure the oxygen concentration.

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But we are not touching the seafloor, we do
not disturb the light, for the first time

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we can really measure an undisturbed, natural
exchange.

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The high quality data that we're now able
to get will allow us to address questions

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related to global warming, global climate
models, and ocean acidification.

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What we're learning is that these coastal
ecosystems store more carbon than forests

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for longer periods of time.

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What drives me to do this work is curiosity.

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We constantly learn something.

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There's always something new to be discovered.

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The work that we're doing, partnerships that
we're building, students that we're training;

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together will help make coastal communities
more resilient and will lead to a better future.