Boggy wetlands, famous for preserving ancient human sacrifices, flavouring whiskey and providing a basic form of fuel, could be one of the answers to keeping carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. But only if alternatives to exploiting these peatlands for agricultural compost are popularised.
Formed by layers of peat – a thick, muddy mass produced by remains of ancient animals – these waterlogged and mossy stretches appear to be of no use for humans. The spongy turf is too soggy for building or farming, and they attract mosquitos and related diseases like malaria.
For decades, therefore, humans have drained the swamp and used dried peat – which helps soil retain nutrients and promote plant growth – as a compost or a growing medium for agriculture, horticulture and forestry.
It was only recently that scientists discovered the danger of doing so.
Small but mighty
Usually, when a plant decomposes, it releases carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere. In peatlands, however, the ecosystem is so soggy that instead of decaying, the plants are trapped, along with their carbon, within the earth.
Peatlands, which cover a mere 3 per cent of the planet’s surface, absorb twice as much carbon as all the world’s forests combined, making them the largest natural carbon store. It also preserves biodiversity, minimise flood risk and ensure safe drinking water.
That striking statistic is matched by a deeply concerning one: degraded peatlands – covering just 0.3 per cent of landmass – account for 5 per cent of man-made global greenhouse emissions each year.
The race is on to develop low-carbon and peat-free soil and seed technology that can meet the needs of various peat-using industries, especially forestry, where growing demand for reforestation has made them one of the biggest consumers.
SilviBio is one agri-tech startup which is working to preserve peatlands, which the New York Times called “the unsung hero of carbon capture”, by developing innovative peat alternatives. Its core product is a bio-based and peat-free soil additive for greenhouse use that improves performance of growing media – or a mixture of components that provide water, air, nutrients to plants. SilviBio’s additive improves the germination rate by 60 per cent compared with untreated fields.
"We’re improving the growing media to reach the performance required by growers, and reduce the overall environmental impact,” says Alicja Dzieciol, co-founder and director of SilviBio.
The seed for SilviBio was sown in 2019, when Dzieciol, who has a background in chemistry, responded to a challenge from Scotland’s public sector forestry organisation. They wanted ideas that could address seed germination and survival following a period of drought in which up to 90 per cent of tree seeds had failed to germinate. Dzieciol received funding for her proposals of a soil additive, as well as a seed coating to improve moisture retention.
She partnered with co-founder Mariela Aguilera Miranda, a plant scientist, to balance her expertise with someone from an agricultural background.
Today, the nine-member team has conducted trials in the UK, Germany, Sweden and Latvia, growing more than a million seedlings in the process.
SilviBio is not just targeting state forestry organisations, but the expanding market for sustainably grown timber. Tree growing at forest nurseries is a complex operation; it is never as simple as switching out one product for another. “If they change the growing substrate, everything needs to be changed,” says Dzieciol. “From the beginning, we’ve been talking with the nursery forest growers to understand what their actual issues are and what they need. And, so, the products have really been made in collaboration.”
Demand for peat-free products is set to grow rapidly as governments around the world pledge tree growing targets while introducing regulations banning peat sales in the coming years.
Already, the use of peat in the UK as a proportion of growing media fell to 24 per cent of total volume in 2022 from over 40 per cent in 2020.Growing Media Monitor, Horticultural Trades Association
With any luck, these measures, along with products like SilviBio’s, mean the thick brown mud of peat can stay undisturbed underground – and continue to store carbon and contribute to the fight against climate change.
This is an edited version the original article, which was initially published here.
Investment insights
by Christoph Butz, senior investment manager, thematic equities, Pictet Asset Management
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Peatlands, together with the world’s forests, have been sucking carbon out of the atmosphere for millennia and they are considered to be key tools in the battle against global warming. Deforestation in South East Asia, carried out to create palm oil plantations, is by far the biggest problem, as this process leads to the mineralisation of peat and thus to huge CO2 emissions. Protection of precious tropical forests is critical both for reducing emissions but also for biodiversity.
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It is also important to properly manage forestland and look after forest ecosystems to maintain the ability of trees to capture carbon. A managed forest – which involves harvesting, planting and replanting as well as protecting biodiversity – captures 10 times more CO2 emissions from the air than an unmanaged counterpart.*
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Sustainable forestry practices achieve exactly that, as they plant and reforest in a permanent cycle where the vegetation cover is always maintained and the underlying peat soil is protected. Sustainable forestry practices and forest certification schemes also provide total protection for particularly high value forest biomes.
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While sustainable forestry companies’ main positive impact comes from maintaining forest cover and practising sustainable silviculture, they can – and increasingly do – take another small, but important step to improve their overall environmental footprint by committing to using only peat-free soils in their tree nurseries.
* including bioenergy and carbon storage. Sbimkchulze, E. et al. (2020). The climate change mitigation effect of bioenergy from sustainably managed forests in Central Europe. GCB Bioenergy. 12. 10.1111/gcbb.12672.
