Defra Lowland Peat 2: Managing agricultural systems on lowland peat for decreased greenhouse gas emissions whilst maintaining agricultural productivity. Report to Defra for Project SP1218

Description

This report describes the results of the Defra "Lowland Peat 2" project, which ran from 2019 to 2023. This Project assessed the opportunities and challenges of managing lowland agricultural peat for reduced greenhouse gas emissions, providing evidence to support Departmental Net Zero ambitions, as well as help inform policy linked to the England Peat Action Plan (2021). Key findings include a detailed review of the opportunities and challenges for paludiculture (wetland-based agriculture) as a potential emissions mitigation measure; additional review scoping the societal impacts of lowland peat drainage, with a focus on the impacts of long-term subsidence; analyses from what is believed to be the largest network of flux towers on agricultural peatlands globally, suggesting that raising water levels could help to mitigate peat GHG emissions, and if correctly optimised may not lead to yield declines.The report also explores the role of "regenerative" farming measures in reducing peat GHGs.

Objective

The project assessed the opportunities and challenges of managing lowland agricultural peat for reduced greenhouse gas emissions. Primarily work in this area looks to support priorities of net zero, climate adaptation and mitigation, national food security, water security, and protection of biodiversity and habitats.. Following the earlier Lowland Peat 1 project (2014-2017) which generated fundamental data on GHG emissions from a range of contrasting lowland peat sites across England and Wales, the project focused primarily on developing and testing options to mitigate these emissions, whilst maintaining the agricultural productivity of lowland peatlands. The project coincided with a number of major peatland-related policy initiatives across the UK, including the Committee on Climate Change's 6th Carbon Budget and Net Zero Strategy, the England Peat Action Plan, and the Defra Lowland Agricultural Peat Task Force. Interim results from the project have fed into many of these initiatives, as well as to an update of emission factors for cropland and grassland on peat in the UK?s National Atmospheric Emissions Inventory.