Saturday 21 May 2011

Peatland biogeochemistry PhD

I am now around half-way through my PhD at Bangor University, in North Wales.

The general research area of the PhD is biogeochemistry, as I’m looking at the physical, biological and chemical processes in peatlands.

More specifically, I’m studying the carbon cycle in peat and the potential of using these types of wetlands to capture and store as much carbon as possible.

The more carbon that can be locked into peatlands the less there will be in the atmosphere as greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide and methane.

This carbon sequestration side of my project has the potential to act as a form of geoengineering - delaying, or even reversing, the effects of climate change.

So far my project has involved plenty of experiments with peat soils and I’ve also been getting to grips with some of the legislation surrounding the environment and climate change.

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