Organic Loss in Drained Wetland Monuments: Managing the Carbon Footprint

Abstract

The recent installation of land drains at Star Carr, Yorkshire, UK, has been linked with loss of preservation quality in this important Mesolithic buried landscape, challenging the PARIS principle. Historically captured organic carbon, including organic artefacts, is being converted to soluble organic compounds and less soluble carbon gases. At the same time sulphur and nitrogen compounds are oxidized to species that are chemically destructive of artefacts and ecofacts. Two of the carbon products, CO₂ and methane, are ‘greenhouse gases’ whose environmental impact can be costed in terms of carbon equivalents, which can be set against an assessment of the gain in agricultural productivity of the land arising from drainage, at Star Carr being the improved cereal crop. Wetland studies elsewhere suggest that such decay processes could be slowed by restoring the historic soil environment, and even reversed to create carbon capture, enabling the farmer to claim carbon credits.

Keywords:

• wetlands
• organic preservation
• peat-wastage
• Holme post
• jellybone
• carbon footprint
• water quality
• preservation in situ

Our thanks to Steve Boreham, Tony Brown, Tim Burkinshaw, Neil Cape, Keri Dinsmore, Chris Durham, Keith Emerick, Jen Heathcote, Will Mayes, Nicky Milner, Ian Panter, Mike Plant, Dominic Powesland, Terhi Riutta, Gordon Turner-Walker.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Brian Durham

Brian Durham is a ‘deep–welly’ fi eld archaeologist with a special interest in the ecological relationship between human populations and their environment, which led him to develop UK curatorial guidelines for urban heritage. His fi rst contribution to the PARIS movement (‘Cleaning up’, 2001 Conference) addressed the natural recycling of humanity’s carbon-based detritus, while fi ve years later (‘To Beguile the Time’, 2006 Conference) he developed a kinetic model of the storage of wetland carbon that doubled as a preserving system for artefacts and ecofacts. In retirement he has raised his eyes to the more challenging environment of the lower troposphere, and is monitoring rain and snowfall with the aim of understanding mechanisms that may have a cleansing effect on the atmosphere, not merely for volcanic residues but for human emissions of greenhouse gases.

Correspondence to: Brian Durham, Research Associate, Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the History of Art, University of Oxford, UK. Email: [email protected]

Robert van de Noort

Robert Van De Noort is a landscape archaeologist with a particular interest in wetlands. His main field projects have been on the Humber Wetlands Project and the excavation of Sutton Common, an Iron Age ‘marsh-fort’ in South Yorkshire. His other research is focused on the archaeology of the North Sea, the sewn-plank boats of the Bronze Age, the impact of climate change on wetlands, and the perceptions of wetlands and the sea in the past and present. Recently, he has developed the concept of ‘Climate Change Archaeology’, which concerns the contribution of archaeological research to current climate change debates.

Vibeke Vandrup Martens

Vibeke Vandrup Martens is a medieval urban research archaeologist with special skills in environmental monitoring of archaeological deposits. She was educated in Lund and Aarhus and has work experience as an archaeologist from Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway. Since 2006 she has worked at NIKU, focusing on urban archaeology and preservation conditions in archaeological deposits. Current research projects concern preservation conditions particularly in the unsaturated zone, coupled with analyses of climate change and its impact on preservation, not only in urban contexts but also on medieval farm mounds in northern Norway (‘In Situ Site Preservation in the Unsaturated Zone’ and ‘In-Situ Farms: Archaeological Deposits in a Changing Climate. In Situ Preservation of Farm Mounds in Northern Norway’).

Michel Vorenhout

Michel Vorenhout is an ecologist with a special research interest in soil chemistry, preservation in situ of archaeological remains and monitoring of natural degradation processes. He is currently affiliated to the University of Amsterdam and runs his own company.