The Big Give Christmas Challenge – Tuesday 1st December

Climate change is a huge challenge for all of us.

Yet, one of the biggest heroes in the fight against global warming is a simple moss, found right here in the Peak District National Park. 

Sphagnum moss is a carbon-defeating superhero – and we need your help to plant more of it on Peak District moorland. Can you help us to Restore Our Moors?

This Christmas the Peak District National Park Foundation in taking on The Big Give’s fundraising challenge to fund restoration work on Peat District moors. Just one donation will have twice the impact – thanks to super match funding from local businesses and The Reed Foundation. The restoration work will be carried out by the Moors for the Future Partnership.

Peat is the single biggest store of carbon in the UK, storing the equivalent of 20 years of all UK CO2 emissions and keeping it out of the atmosphere.

But there is a problem. The moors in the Peak District, home to this precious peat, are badly damaged from centuries of industrial pollution from the surrounding cities of Sheffield and Manchester. 

Peat on the moors is badly degraded; it is bare and dry – not the lush green landscape that it needs to be to store carbon. 

Globally, 25% of peatlands have been destroyed and, in the UK, at least 80% are damaged. In fact the problem is even worse because damaged peat moors actually gives out carbon, at a rate of 10 million tonnes a year.

We need your help to fund vital moorland restoration – including planting bog plants like the carbon defeating sphagnum moss – to help to turn this problem around.

Through the Big Give, all donations to our Restore Our Moors fundraiser will be doubled. For example, if you give £20 we can spend £40 on sphagnum plants. One donation, twice the impact.

Mollie Hunt works with both science and conservation teams at the Moors for the Future Partnership. She says: “We’re delighted that the Peak District National Park Foundation is taking part in the Big Give Christmas Challenge and that they have taken this opportunity for local communities to support our work to restore our local peatlands.

“In good condition, our moorlands provide us with a host of benefits, giving us space to explore, breathe and play. They also capture carbon and help in the fight against climate change. But they need help to bring them back to a condition were they’re able to do that after centuries of pollution.

“We’re bringing back wetter conditions to the moors and planting sphagnum moss, which absorbs carbon from the atmosphere and forms layers of peat. Please help us to replant sphagnum moss across one of the most degraded landscapes in Europe and help these moorlands to start locking up carbon once again.”

To be matched, donations must be given via our page on The Big Give website between 12pm on Tuesday 1st December and 12pm on Tuesday 8th December. 

Sign up to our newsletter now to receive an email with the donation link as soon as the match funding goes live – www.peakdistrictfoundation.org.uk/newsletter

Follow us on social media for updates throughout the week of our progress – search on your preferred channel for Peak District National Park Foundation.