New Study on Peatlands and Drought

Drought makes peat release far more carbon into the atmosphere and into watercourses than scientists had previously thought, a new study shows.

Once a peat bog dries out, it starts emitting carbon by giving off carbon dioxide gas (CO₂) and methane into the atmosphere, and by releasing it into rivers and streams in the form of dissolved organic carbon (DOC).

This loss can carry on for a decade or more, and can continue or accelerate even after the bog is submerged again. And the type of bog habitat that's worst-affected accounts for some 60 per cent of the world's peatlands.

'Our findings on re-wetting were a huge surprise,' says Dr Nathalie Fenner of Bangor University, lead author of the paper, which appears in Nature Geoscience. 'There has been a lot of research on the impact of drought on peatlands but this is the first study that shows it can carry on for years after the drought has ended in a range of peats, but more importantly why - it seems to turbo-charge carbon emissions even once the water table has risen again.'

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