In England, restoring peat bogs, CO2 sinks

On the side of a windswept hill in a remote corner of northern England, a pioneering peatland restoration project seeks to restore this degraded natural environment to its role as a natural carbon sink

In England, restoring peat bogs, CO2 sinks

On the side of a windswept hill in a remote corner of northern England, a pioneering peatland restoration project seeks to restore this degraded natural environment to its role as a natural carbon sink.

The "Ridge Graham" project, which mobilizes a tanker truck, a helicopter, an excavator and a team of ten people, aims to restore the site to its original state: waterlogged and CO2 sensor.

Because at present, on the other hand, the 450 hectares - the equivalent of approximately 840 football pitches - of this degraded peat bog located in Bewcastle release greenhouse gases, like many other over-exploited ones, hampering the UK government's 2050 carbon neutral target.

Peatlands are wet ecosystems formed from partially decomposed, carbon-rich organic matter.

They cover about 3% of the earth's surface and are the largest natural reservoir of carbon. They also contribute to minimizing the risk of flooding, purifying groundwater and preserving air quality.

But when sites deteriorate, usually after being exploited, for livestock farming in particular, they become a source of carbon, responsible for up to 10% of annual global emissions according to the specialized association International Peatland Society.

In Bewcastle, a company has for the first time received public funds to restore a private peat bog: a grant of 813,000 pounds (913,000 euros). Ridge Carbon Capture (RCC) is also working on a dozen similar projects in the country.

"Peatland restoration is incredibly expensive, so you have to find a way to make it economically viable," said Betsy Glasgow-Vasey, 28, one of the company's managers.

Moving up the hill, it shows the work done since the project was launched in September. Hundreds of small brick dams were erected and on the heights, barriers made of rolls of coconut fiber were installed.

The teams covered the ground with heather because "when the bogs are exposed to the air, that's when they start releasing all the emissions from the decaying vegetation," says Ms Glasgow-Vasey.

The cuttings of heather are undertaken wherever there are holes in the vast terrain, "like when icing a cake".

The UK has seven million hectares of peatland, around 10% of its land area. The 80% of them that are in poor condition and emit ten million tonnes of CO2 per year, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

"We need to restore our peatlands and we need to do it now!" Renée Kerkvliet-Hermans, peatland coordinator for the union, which certifies projects like "Ridge Graham's" by generating " carbon units".

In the idea, the costs of the project will thus be offset by the tonnes of carbon generated and resold on the carbon market, which is increasingly crucial for the financing of projects to mitigate the effects of climate change.

Enough to overcome the significant financial obstacles to such a restoration. But government support also remains crucial "because the price of carbon is currently not high enough", says Ms Glasgow-Vasey.

London wants to restore 35,000 hectares of English peat bogs by 2025. The authorities "have understood that the peat bogs we have are very important", assures Stuart Evans, of the Ridge Graham project. "And they're so degraded."

It's unclear exactly how long it will take for Bewcastle Bog to transition from being a carbon source to a sink, but progress will be regularly assessed.

For Ms Glasgow-Vasey, the important thing is elsewhere: "we have somehow become aware of what this type of project can do".

03/09/2023 12:35:07 -          Bewcastle (Royaume-Uni) (AFP) -         © 2023 AFP