Posted on:
16 April 2025
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Loch Katrine's 400-Hectare Peatland Restoration Project
16 April 2025
Scottish Water has completed work on the first phase of a major 400-hectare peat restoration project at Loch Katrine, aimed at protecting the water quality for over a million customers in and around Glasgow.
Since work commenced in January, over 50 hectares of peatland has now been restored, reducing the amount of organic material that can be washed into the loch during periods of heavy rainfall.
Since work commenced in January, over 50 hectares of peatland has now been restored, reducing the amount of organic material that can be washed into the loch during periods of heavy rainfall.
Loch Katrine Peatland
Works will enable healthy peatland to thrive and emit carbon into the atmosphere.
Work will now pause due to the bird nesting season until October but is set to continue seasonally across the entire catchment surrounding the loch over the next decade totalling over 400 hectares by the end of the project.“This will help make the water treatment process more efficient and less costly, ensuring that we can continue to provide customers with high quality drinking water ”
Alan Macdonald
Project Manager
The restoration work is focusing on reducing the number of manmade drains and areas of bare peat across the catchment, by blocking up ditches and reprofiling peat hags to enable water to be held within the land again instead of washing straight off into the loch.
It will also enable the healthy peatland to act as a giant carbon sink, instead of emitting carbon into the atmosphere, helping Scottish Water to reach its net zero target of 2040.
Scottish Water project manager Alan Macdonald said: “Often these areas were used for sheep grazing, so measures were put in place to drain the water from the land to make it more suitable for this. This, combined, with large numbers of deer trampling the vegetation has exposed really large peat hags which have no vegetation growing on them and which allow water to wash straight off them into the loch.”
He added: “This is a long-term programme of work with the aim of trying to keep as much water up on the hillside as we possibly can, so that we can limit the amount of peat and organic material that is draining off into the water supply."
Lavish Landscape
50 hectares of peatland has been restored as of April 2025, marking the first phase of the project as complete.
The project is part of a wider land management plan for the catchment, in partnership with long-term tenant Forestry and Land Scotland, which will also see one of Europe’s largest woodlands created on the surrounding land through the planting and regeneration of native broadleaf trees - continuing the expansion of the Great Trossachs Forest, in the heart of Loch Lomond and The Trossachs National Park.
The work at Loch Katrine has received funding through Peatland ACTION, a national programme to restore Scotland’s peatlands. Peatland ACTION funding comes through the Scottish Government’s Climate Change Plan for Net Zero, with a commitment to invest £250 million to support the restoration of 250,000 hectares of peatlands by 2030. Peatland ACTION provides funding, support and advice to deliver on-the-ground peatland restoration delivered through a network of partner organisations including Scottish Water. Work at Loch Katrine was carried out by contractor George Leslie.
Jared Stewart, who manages Scottish Water’s peatland restoration programme, said: “The land management plan for Loch Katrine, in partnership with Forestry and Land Scotland, Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park Authority and Peatland ACTION, sets out to increase biodiversity through woodland creation and peatland restoration and deliver a world class drinking water catchment.
“And while we are working hard to drive down carbon emissions throughout all our activities, these projects will also ensure that we are able to lock up carbon within our land holdings and support our journey to net zero emissions by 2040.”
The work at Loch Katrine has received funding through Peatland ACTION, a national programme to restore Scotland’s peatlands. Peatland ACTION funding comes through the Scottish Government’s Climate Change Plan for Net Zero, with a commitment to invest £250 million to support the restoration of 250,000 hectares of peatlands by 2030. Peatland ACTION provides funding, support and advice to deliver on-the-ground peatland restoration delivered through a network of partner organisations including Scottish Water. Work at Loch Katrine was carried out by contractor George Leslie.
Jared Stewart, who manages Scottish Water’s peatland restoration programme, said: “The land management plan for Loch Katrine, in partnership with Forestry and Land Scotland, Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park Authority and Peatland ACTION, sets out to increase biodiversity through woodland creation and peatland restoration and deliver a world class drinking water catchment.
“And while we are working hard to drive down carbon emissions throughout all our activities, these projects will also ensure that we are able to lock up carbon within our land holdings and support our journey to net zero emissions by 2040.”
