Overriding water table control on managed peatland greenhouse gas emissions

Global peatlands store more carbon than is naturally present in the atmosphere. However, many peatlands are under pressure with the equivalent of 3% of all anthropogenic greenhouse gases emitted from drained peatland. In this new study, we report data from 57 locations and combine them with published data from sites across all major peatland biomes and find that the mean annual effective water-table depth overrides all other ecosystem- and management-related impacts to control the greenhouse gas fluxes. The paper shows that halving WTD_e in all drained agricultural peatlands could reduce emissions by the equivalent of over 1% of global anthropogenic em​issions.

Overriding water table control on managed peatland greenhouse gas emissions | Nature