The state faces the prospect of paying more than €250m buying bogs on which turf- cutting is no longer allowed.

Farmers could be set for a massive windfall after a report commissioned by Environment Minister John Gormley said the cost of buying 130 bogs across the country could reach “in excess” of €227m, plus another €50m in legal costs.

But even if the bogs are not bought outright, the minister is considering buying turbary (turf cutting) rights from affected landowners.

The cost of doing this would be €54m, paid out over six years. A compensation scheme for landowners is also being considered, which would cost €42m over 14 years.

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By Paul Melia Farming Independent Tuesday June 01 2010

On the Occasion of World Wetland Day 2010 events are taking place all over the world– see Ramsar Convention website
In Trinity College, a seminar with guest speakers and discussion workgroups will focus on concrete action for better protection of wetlands and wetland functions, especially wetland value for flood control and biodiversity.

The event is being organised by Coastwatch in cooperation with Civil and Environmental Engineering TCD. The proceedings are to be published and used towards wise management of wetlands.

For more information click here

Iceland wants wetland restoration to be assessed for emission reduction units at the summit to work out a new deal on climate change in December in Copenhagen.
More carbon dioxide is released when wetlands are disturbed or destroyed than when forests are cut down. This is especially the case with peatlands, which contain dead organic matter (peat) with a carbon content of over 50 percent. These form under wet conditions where lack of oxygen hinders decomposition; wet conditions therefore limit the release of carbon dioxide.

There is a new focus on peatlands in climate change negotiations because of their high carbon content, which is released into the atmosphere when peatlands are damaged or drained. This is the rationale for including wetland and peatland restoration as a means of securing credits by Annex-1 countries in the new commitment period due from 2012 following the Kyoto Protocol.

A ‘global assessment on peatlands, diversity and climate change’ produced last year by the international non-governmental groups Wetlands International and the Global Environment Centre showed that carbon dioxide emissions from drained and damaged peatlands amount to more than 3,000 million tonnes annually, or over 11 percent of global fossil fuel emissions.

Rewetting peatlands can lead to an increase in methane emissions, but this is nearly always counterbalanced by a much larger decrease in carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide (N20) emissions. Besides carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and methane are the two other greenhouse gases known to cause global warming.

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Corinna Byrne , co-ordinator of the Carbon Cycles and Sinks Network, examined the policies needed to get Irish land to absorb CO2 rather than release it. Besides discussing how the large amounts of carbon locked up in peatlands can be safeguarded, she reviewed the role that biochar could play in reducing nitrous oxide and methane emissions and building up the fertility and carbon content of the soil.

Corinna Byrne – Carbon Cycles and Sinks from Feasta on Vimeo.

Recorded on day three of The New Emergency Conference: Managing Risk and Building Resilience in a Resource Constrained World. Held on 10-12 June 2009, All Hallows College, Drumcondra, Dublin 9, Ireland

 The working group is due to report its recommendations to the Minister in October of this year

The deadline for submissions to the working group on the cessation of turf cutting is July 17. Submissions can be made by email to designated.bogs@environ.ie or in writing to: The Secretary, Cessation of Turf Cutting Working Group, National Parks & Wildlife Service, 7 Ely Place, Dublin. The working group is due to report its recommendations to the Minister in October of this year

Peatmoss has been the mainstay of horticulture, amateur and professional, over much of the developed world. It is said that a single cubic metre of extracted peat will eventually release some 50kg of carbon dioxide; this is only a latter-day calculation, to be set beside concern for peatland’s special wildlife and ecosystems.

Sphagnum peat is still a main ingredient in the two-million cubic metres of growing media that Bord na Móna sells annually, mostly to the UK and Western Europe, in the Shamrock-branded products taken over a decade ago by the US multi-national Scott Company. Yet, as part of its “New Contract with Nature”, announced as policy last year, Bord na Móna has joined the Growing Media Initiative, so vigorously promoted by the UK’s Horticultural Trade Association, with government support, and backed by big national DIY stores such as B Q. Bord na Móna’s membership of the GMI commits it to “working towards 90 per cent peat reduction in the UK horticulture retail market”, as urged by Britain’s Biodiversity Action Plan.

Indeed, it hopes to reach 60 per cent reduction in the UK retail compost bags by the end of the year.

It will not be cutting into any new bogs. It has been conserving and restoring for nature some of those still untouched, and helping to create wilderness areas in its oldest cutaways. While diversifying now into other energy initiatives, such as growing algae for biofuel, it is shaving away the last of its great midland peat-plains. Bord na Mona’s waste composting centre at Kilberry, near Monasterevan in Co Kildare, is the largest of its kind in Ireland. Here, it takes in huge quantities of redundant shrubbery, brown wheely-bin waste, spent brewery barley, sawdust, discarded supermarket fruit and veg, and so on– all great organic stuff – much of it for the Shamrock peat-free sowing and potting compost.

Bord na Móna may have erased a great share of Ireland’s raised bogs, but its New Contract with Nature and new R D initiatives seems a promising national example of treating all manner of waste as a resource.

Friends of the Irish Environment claim that peat extraction allegedly for export to countries where extraction is illegal and “on a huge scale, with no planning permission or environmental impact assessment”. These times could again be hard on nature, with any sort of enterprise, income or cheap fuel supply being seen as having prior claim.

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Turf-cutting on Ferbane, Mongan and Moyclare bogs in Offaly will continue this year, despite plans for a ten-year derogation on some designated bogs to expire this year.

Welcoming the announced by the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government John Gormley, Cllr Sinead Dooley said: “The message to all bog owners in Offaly is clear: Cutting on all bogs during 2009 will be allowed to continue as before.”

The derogation expires on 32 raised bogs. The Minister said that only a small proportion, 4%, of peatlands in the State would be affected by this measure. There are over 1,500 raised bogs in the State and only 139 of these have been designated for nature protection.

Proposals  are to be drawn up for bogs affected. The Minister announced the establishment of a working group to examine and report on issues involved in implementing the cessation and undertaking the restoration of these bogs. This group is to report back to the Government by the autumn with proposals on methods of compensation, where appropriate, overall costs, possible sources of funding, and on the administration of the cessation of turf cutting and restoration of these bogs. The Working Group will be made up of officials from relevant Government Departments, Offices and Agencies and will be required to consult widely with relevant interests.

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