Scottish Water is restoring over 500 hectares of peatland in East Ayrshire as part of its bid to protect water quality and cut carbon in the face of climate change.

The project, focused on land surrounding Afton Reservoir near New Cumnock, is the largest peatland restoration scheme carried out by the publicly owned utility company to date and has been split into two phases.

Work on the first phase, totaling almost 300 hectares, is set to be complete before the end of the year, with the second phase also getting underway in November. This will be split over two seasons, with work on the project as a whole expected to be complete before the end of 2025.

Diggers working on the peatland restoration project at Afton Reservoirs

The scheme aims to return the land to a more natural state by closing up the drains which cover much of the area – using a technique called zippering. This allows water to be held within the land, encouraging healthy peatlands and preventing erosion.

Scottish Water project manager, Alan MacDonald, said:

“The work we are doing here will reduce the organic matter that is feeding into the reservoir, ensuring the quality of our source water remains high and making the job of treating it less time consuming and costly.”

He added:

“When peat dries out, it erodes and releases carbon. This project will mean water is held within the land, helping the peatland to restore to its natural state and allowing it to capture carbon very effectively.

“There are drains all over these hillsides and they were obviously there for a purpose – to dry the land. Sometimes that was ahead of forestry work, sometimes that was to dry the land where sheep were being grazed.

“But with the increasing need to cut carbon emissions due to the climate emergency, drying out of hillsides is not what we want to do so we’re putting back to nature what man did.

“These projects will make a key contribution to our own net zero journey locking up carbon, supporting biodiversity and helping the Scottish Government’s targets for peatland restoration in Scotland. They are also vital in making our water sources more resilient to future climate change.”

Craig MacDonald, sub agent with contractor George Leslie, said:

“Zippering is much like the zipper of a hoodie where you take blocks of peat with the turf intact and you dig the excavator’s bucket in a zipper like fashion, and pull it in towards each other - this stitches together the existing drain line of the peat which generates the water to come to the surface and return it more to a bog.”

Photo: Afton Reservoir 

Afton Reservoir is six miles south of New Cumnock and is fed by a sizeable catchment area drawing water from all the surrounding hills. The land here drains into the reservoir, with the water taken to a treatment works in Afton before it goes on to supply much of Ayrshire.