Formation:
– Peat forms in acidic and anaerobic conditions with plant material not fully decaying.
– It consists mainly of wetland vegetation like mosses, sedges, and shrubs.
– As peat accumulates, it holds water, creating wetter conditions and expanding the wetland area.
– Peatland features can include ponds, ridges, and raised bogs.
– Some bog plants actively promote bog formation, like sphagnum mosses that secrete tannins preserving organic material.
Types of Peat Material:
– Peat material is fibric, hemic, or sapric.
– Fibric peats are least decomposed with intact fiber, hemic peats are partially decomposed, and sapric peats are the most decomposed.
– Phragmites peat is denser and composed of reed grass.
– Engineers consider peat soils problematic due to poor consolidation properties.
– Soil with high organic material percentage cannot serve as a stable foundation for roads or buildings.
Peatlands Distribution:
– Peatlands cover over 4 million square kilometers, representing 3% of the planet’s land and freshwater surface.
– They store one-third of the world’s soil carbon and 10% of global freshwater resources.
– Peatlands are adapted to extreme conditions like high water, low oxygen, and low plant nutrient availability.
– They occur on all continents, from tropical to boreal zones.
– Global peatland coverage is approximately 4.23 million square kilometers.
Uses of Peat:
– Peat is used for gardening and horticulture in some regions.
– By volume, there are about 4 trillion cubic meters of peat globally.
– Peat is the first step in forming fossil fuels like coal.
– Peatlands are efficient carbon sinks, storing up to 550 Gt of carbon globally.
– Peat regrowth rate is slow, making it a non-renewable energy source.
Impact on Climate Change:
– Centuries of burning and draining peat release CO2 into the atmosphere.
– Peatland restoration is crucial to limit climate change.
– Peat stores 42% of all soil carbon, exceeding carbon stored in forests.
– Peatlands take thousands of years to develop deposits.
– Peat extraction rates exceed its regrowth rate, leading to environmental concerns.
Peat (/piːt/) is an accumulation of partially decayed vegetation or organic matter. It is unique to natural areas called peatlands, bogs, mires, moors, or muskegs. Sphagnum moss, also called peat moss, is one of the most common components in peat, although many other plants can contribute. The biological features of sphagnum mosses act to create a habitat aiding peat formation, a phenomenon termed 'habitat manipulation'. Soils consisting primarily of peat are known as histosols. Peat forms in wetland conditions, where flooding or stagnant water obstructs the flow of oxygen from the atmosphere, slowing the rate of decomposition. Peat properties such as organic matter content and saturated hydraulic conductivity can exhibit high spatial heterogeneity.
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Peatlands, particularly bogs, are the primary source of peat; although less common, other wetlands, including fens, pocosins, and peat swamp forests, also deposit peat. Landscapes covered in peat are home to specific kinds of plants including Sphagnum moss, ericaceous shrubs, and sedges. Because organic matter accumulates over thousands of years, peat deposits provide records of past vegetation and climate by preserving plant remains, such as pollen. This allows the reconstruction of past environments and the study of changes in land use.
Peat is used by gardeners and for horticulture in certain parts of the world, but this is being banned in some places. By volume, there are about 4 trillion cubic metres of peat in the world. Over time, the formation of peat is often the first step in the geological formation of fossil fuels such as coal, particularly low-grade coal such as lignite. The peatland ecosystem covers 3.7 million square kilometres (1.4 million square miles) and is the most efficient carbon sink on the planet, because peatland plants capture carbon dioxide (CO2) naturally released from the peat, maintaining an equilibrium. In natural peatlands, the "annual rate of biomass production is greater than the rate of decomposition", but it takes "thousands of years for peatlands to develop the deposits of 1.5 to 2.3 m [4.9 to 7.5 ft], which is the average depth of the boreal [northern] peatlands", which store around 415 gigatonnes (Gt) of carbon (about 46 times 2019 global CO2 emissions). Globally, peat stores up to 550 Gt of carbon, 42% of all soil carbon, which exceeds the carbon stored in all other vegetation types, including the world's forests, although it covers just 3% of the land's surface.
Peat is not a renewable source of energy, due to its extraction rate in industrialized countries far exceeding its slow regrowth rate of 1 mm (0.04 in) per year, and as it is also reported that peat regrowth takes place only in 30–40% of peatlands. Centuries of burning and draining of peat by humans has released a significant amount of CO2 into the atmosphere, and much peatland restoration is needed to help limit climate change.