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An image taken with a drone shows the Bronze Age Fernworthy Stone Circle in the landscape of Dartmoor, Britain, 25 March 2025. The South West Peatland Partnership is working to restore degraded peatland across large areas of the UK. Since Roman times, peat has been used as fuel and for fertiliser in agricultural use. In Dartmoor, which is common land, people were able to cut peat on a large scale by draining the land and digging long gullies, which reduced the water table and damaged the remaining peat. The practice was industrialised until the 1950s. Currently, the UK government has set targets to phase out peat use in horticulture by 2030. Peat bogs are environmentally vital as they store huge amounts of carbon, twice as much as the world's forests. The degradation of peatland leads to carbon being released into the atmosphere, which adds to global warming. Justine Reed from South West Water notes: “In the UK, the health of peatlands acts like a canary in a coal mine. When this ecosystem becomes damaged, then it means a catastrophic environmental disaster will follow. Currently we are on the edge but can’t afford to let things get worse”. (Photo by Neil Hall/EPA)
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