While peat has been forming in our uplands for many a thousand years, a variety of problems and pressures have resulted in a great loss of our peatlands, and a deterioration in the biodiversity of these habitats.
Pressures are to include acid rain from industrial emissions, digging of drainage channels to provide water to grazing lands, increased grazing, wildfires, and inappropriate burnings. As peatlands are a major storage of carbon in the world, damage to peat causes it to release its stored carbon into our atmosphere greatly contributing to greenhouse gas emissions and therefore impacting the environment.
Damage to peatland also contributes to colour and sediment in the raw water that is collected, making the drinking water that we all drink more difficult and expensive to treat. It is in the interest of the wider environment to return our peatlands back to their original state.