Ocean Negative Carbon Emissions (ONCE) Programme Secretariat established in Xiamen
The Ocean Negative Carbon Emissions (ONCE) Programme Secretariat was officially established in Xiamen, East China’s Fujian province on March 29th.
Based on the original theory of “marine microbial carbon pump”, the ONCE programme was initiated by Jiao Nianzhi, an academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences.
It is learned that the programme is aiming to explore the mechanism of negative ocean emission process and provide solutions for global negative ocean carbon emission, with international cooperation and collaborative research.
"Negative emission means active increasing of carbon sinks.”, said Dr. Jiao, “The theory of ‘marine microbial carbon pump’ means that the physiological and ecological processes of marine microorganisms and biogeochemical processes convert organic carbon from the available active state, to the unavailable inert dissolved organic carbon, which holds the key to the mystery of marine carbon pool.”
Last October, the ONCE programme was officially approved by the Ministry of Science and Technology of the People's Republic of China.
Currently, it was listed among key plans of “the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development”, and has established partnerships with 78 scientific research institutions from 33 countries across the world.