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Turning the tide of climate solutions to save tidal flats

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Tidal flats are vital carbon sinks and biodiversity hotspots, yet they face increasing threats from misapplied climate solutions, including mangrove afforestation and renewable energy expansion. Protecting tidal flats from well-intentioned but misapplied solutions is crucial for aligning global climate and biodiversity goals.

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Fig. 1: Tidal flats support a unique set of species of great economic value, champion migrants and highly endangered species.
The alternative text for this image may have been generated using AI.
Fig. 2: Mangrove afforestation and renewable energy deployment along the eastern China coast.
The alternative text for this image may have been generated using AI.

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Acknowledgements

We thank D. Wilcove for discussions and comments on the earlier versions of this manuscript. We acknowledge funding from High Meadows Foundation (T.M.) and NTU Start-Up Grant (03INS002001C210) and MoE Tier 1 Grant (04MNP004127C210) (Y.Z.).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Princeton School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA

    Tong Mu

  2. Asian School of the Environment, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Singapore

    Yiwen Zeng

  3. School of Social Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Singapore

    Yiwen Zeng

  4. School of Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing, China

    Zhi Lu

Authors

  1. Tong Mu
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  2. Yiwen Zeng
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  3. Zhi Lu
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Correspondence to
Tong Mu.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Nature Sustainability thanks Mingming Jia and Xiaoguang Ouyang for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Mu, T., Zeng, Y. & Lu, Z. Turning the tide of climate solutions to save tidal flats.
Nat Sustain (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-026-01802-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-026-01802-1

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