We all know plants help fight climate change, right? Trees absorb carbon dioxide from the air, hold onto it in their trunks, roots, and leaves, and in return, they help keep the planet cooler.
A single tree can pull over a ton of carbon from the air during its lifetime. That’s pretty impressive.
But here’s something surprising: moss. Yes, that soft green stuff you see on rocks or shady spots in your yard. It turns out it’s doing a whole lot more than just looking pretty. A new study says moss might be a secret climate hero.
This study was published in Nature Geoscience (which is a respected scientific journal). It was led by two experts: David Eldridge, a drylands ecologist from Australia, and Manuel Delgado-Baquerizo, an ecosystem scientist from Spain.
They teamed up with dozens of other researchers from all over the world. They studied moss from a wide variety of environments.
And what did they find? Moss-covered areas store billions of tons more carbon than bare soil.
Specifically, around 6.43 billion metric tons.
To give you some perspective, that’s six times the amount of carbon released every year through land use changes (like deforestation, urbanization, and mining).
That’s a huge deal.
How did they figure this out? The team collected soil samples from 16 countries across all continents. They weren’t just looking at carbon. They examined 23 other factors related to biodiversity and ecosystem health, including nutrients, organic matter, and even soil diseases.
And here’s the kicker: soil with moss had more nutrients, faster organic decomposition, and fewer soil-borne plant diseases. All in all, mossy soil performed much better than bare soil. That’s a win for the planet.
Peter Reich, a forest ecologist from the University of Michigan, helped explain why moss matters. He said moss works a lot like trees do. “Like forests, mosses stabilize the microclimate and the physical environment beneath them,” he explained. “They also provide minerals and carbon to the soil, making it a better home for soil microbes.”
Another key point? Moss is everywhere. The study found that mosses cover more than 3.6 million square miles (9.4 million square kilometers) of the Earth.
That’s roughly the size of Canada or China. With that kind of coverage, mosses are clearly a major player in the fight against climate change.
Even better? Mosses can grow where other plants can’t. In places that are salty, sandy, or have unpredictable rain, mosses still manage to survive. They still contribute to soil biodiversity and carbon storage. That kind of resilience is rare and valuable.
The study, published on May 1, emphasized that we need to take a broad approach when considering how nature helps us fight climate change.
“These findings support the idea that we can use nature in many ways to fight climate change,” Reich said. “Mosses matter because they show that even small plants in tough places can capture and store carbon, just like large trees do elsewhere. And they do it all over the world.”
Looking ahead, Reich believes future research should explore the roles of all types of vegetation, not just moss and trees, in storing carbon.
“As scientists, we need to understand all of Earth’s vegetation—on land, in wet and dry areas, warm and cold, and even in water like coasts and oceans—and their role in capturing carbon,” Reich said. “By understanding their individual contributions, we can shape smarter policies to manage nature effectively and help vegetation protect the planet.”
Funding for the study came from the British Ecological Society.
At the end of the day, it’s a good reminder that we’re all in this together—people, trees, moss. The Earth needs all the help it can get. And who would’ve thought that help might just be growing quietly beneath our feet?
