When RWE announced its collaboration with the University of the Highlands and Islands on 23 July, it marked something more than another corporate press release. Here was a major energy developer choosing to fund rigorous, on-the-ground study into one of the most contentious aspects of renewable infrastructure: how to treat the vast quantities of peat displaced when building onshore wind farms across Scotland's northern landscapes.
The two-year Knowledge Transfer Partnership, jointly supported by UK Research and Innovation, sets out to close a genuine gap. Academics have long understood that healthy peatlands store carbon, sustain distinctive ecosystems, regulate water flows, reduce flood risk and supply drinking water to large parts of the UK population. Yet the practical question of what to do with peat once it has been excavated during construction has received far less systematic attention. This project aims to change that by examining how such material can be managed and reused in ways that support genuine habitat restoration rather than simply moving the problem elsewhere.
Heather Johnstone, appointed as the KTP Associate Peatland Management and Restoration Officer and based in Inverness, brings direct experience to the role. She previously worked as a research assistant in peatland science at the same university, including studies focused on the Flow Country UNESCO World Heritage Site. Her appointment signals a deliberate effort to ground the work in specialised regional knowledge. Initial fieldwork is already under way in Caithness, with preliminary findings expected after the first year and a final report due at the project's conclusion.
I am excited to start my new role as a KTP Associate: Peatland Management and Restoration Officer with RWE and UHI. I will be looking at how we can best manage the peat excavated for wind farm construction. Scotland’s peatlands are critical environmental assets, which store carbon, provide and protect unique ecosystems, and reduce flood risks, so I am looking forward to playing a role in protecting and restoring them.
That measured tone from Johnstone reflects the project's underlying logic. Scotland's peatlands cover roughly one quarter of the country's land area, yet an estimated 75 percent are degraded or damaged. Simply halting all development in such terrain is not a realistic option for a nation committed to expanding reliable low-carbon electricity. The alternative is to develop evidence-based methods that allow necessary infrastructure while actively improving the condition of these landscapes. Kristen Liptrot, RWE's biodiversity and ecology manager, frames the partnership in precisely these terms.
It is vital that renewable energy projects are developed in a way that protects and enhances the natural environment. This partnership reflects RWE's commitment to innovation and to finding practical solutions that support both climate goals and the long-term health of Scotland's internationally important peatlands.
What makes this initiative noteworthy is its character as a private-sector-led, academically rigorous effort rather than another layer of top-down regulation. Industry is choosing to invest in the detailed science required to reconcile energy production with ecological function. The work builds on RWE's existing restoration experience at Scottish sites and could, in time, inform practices well beyond Scotland's borders in other peat-rich regions. In an era when abstract targets too often collide with physical realities on the ground, this kind of targeted, practical research offers a more hopeful path.
The causal chain is clear enough. Decades of drainage, agriculture and poor land management left Scotland's peatlands in poor condition. Expanding renewable energy infrastructure risks repeating old patterns of disturbance unless better techniques are developed. By focusing on the reuse and restoration potential of excavated peat, the partnership confronts that risk directly. It treats peat not as mere waste to be disposed of, but as a resource whose carbon and hydrological value can be preserved and even enhanced.
