Indonesian peat restoration has more benefits than it costs, study finds

JAKARTA — Restoring Indonesia’s tropical peatlands is a cost-effective strategy to reduce the impacts of fires tearing through the carbon-rich soil, a new study says. The benefits of effective peatland restoration — blocking drainage canals to restore water levels and reestablishing vegetation cover — will outweigh the cost of restoration, according to the peer-reviewed paper published in the journal Nature Communications on Dec. 2. The study authors calculate that peatland restoration could have resulted in economic savings of $8.4 billion between 2004 and 2015, when the six largest fire even…

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