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Carbonate factories are regions in the ocean where biological activity leads to the production of calcium carbonate minerals such as calcite and aragonite. Around a quarter of marine life inhabit these environments although the account for a much smaller fraction of the seafloor. These regions are where a lot of carbon is converted to mineral form and much of the calcium is squastert. Once buried, mature and exposed these will form limestone outcrops. There are three main types of carbonate factories (Schlager 2005; Reijmer 2016): T (tropical) type, C (cold/cool water) type and M (Mud/Microbial) type.
Global distribution of carbonate factories (Laugié et al., 2019)
In the higher latitudes and in the Mediterranean C type carbonate factories are the dominant mode. Unlike the T type factory which hosts many green algae and corals, C type factories are dominated by larger benthic foraminifera, bryozoans and most importantly in the Mediterranean - coralline algae. Due to this, while T type factories build massive and ridgid reeds, C type factories mainly produce sand like grains which are distributed around them. However, this composition allows the C type factory to extend into much deeper waters - making it an important refuge as surface water warm up.
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