科技 泥炭沼泽及气候变化 湿！湿！湿！

　　Forests are not the only habitat whose conservation matters to the climate

　　森林并不是唯一事关气候保护的栖息地

　　RUSSIA does not normally spring to mind as being in the forefront of the fight against climate change. The citizens of Moscow, however, need no explanation of one aspect of the problem—the importance of wetlands. Earlier this year they had an abrupt and lethal lesson on the dangers of peat-bog fires. An unusually hot summer set such fires across the country and the peatlands around Moscow generated a smog that blanketed the city with carbon monoxide and soot. By August 9th the daily death rate had climbed to 700, twice the normal level for that time of the year.

　　俄罗斯通常并不想冲在应对气候变化斗争的最前线。但是莫斯科公民不需要任何解释，就知道湿地的重要性。今年早些时候的泥炭湿地火灾给他们上了一课，火灾地发生让人措手不及却关系生死。一个不同寻常的酷暑在全国各地引发了多起类似火灾，而莫斯科周围的泥炭湿地火灾更是让整个城市笼罩在一氧化碳和煤灰的烟雾中。 8月9日的日死亡人数上升到700人，是往年这个时候的2倍。

　　Whether peat-bog fires are being encouraged by climate change is debatable. But it is clear that they release prodigious quantities of climate-changing carbon dioxide when they happen. And even in the absence of fire, draining peatlands—for example, for agriculture—liberates a lot of carbon dioxide. In Russia such drainage is reckoned to free 160m tonnes of the gas every year. In Indonesia the figure is 508m tonnes. All told, the global total is about 1.3 billion tonnes—6% of man-made carbon-dioxide emissions even without the effect of fire. That is far more than the contribution made by aviation, for example.

　　虽然泥炭湿地大火是否是由气候变化所引发的仍有争议，但当火灾发生时，它们会释放出大量致使气候变化的二氧化碳却显而易见。即使在没有火灾发生的情况下，排水后的泥炭地（比如让地于农业）就会释放出大量二氧化碳。在俄罗斯，这类排水后的泥炭地估计每年释放出1600万吨的气体，而在印度尼西亚，该数字是5080万吨。全球排放总量约为13亿吨，即使在没有火灾发生的情况下依然占人类二氧化碳排放总量的6%，远高于航空业所作的"贡献"。

　　This is both a problem and an opportunity, as climate negotiators now realise. The solution to those fires (and, indeed, to all peat-related carbon-dioxide emissions) is simple and relatively cheap: stop draining wetlands and allow water to accumulate in them again. On December 11th climate negotiators at the United Nations' meeting in Cancún, Mexico, agreed that peatland "rewetting", as it is rather inelegantly known, could be a way for some countries to offset emissions of carbon dioxide from other sources, under the Kyoto protocol or any agreement that follows it.

　　气候谈判代表普遍认为，这既是一个问题，又是一个机遇。解决这些火灾（包括所有泥炭地相关的二氧化碳排放）的方法很简单，也很便宜：停止湿地排水，让水重新聚集。在12月11日，联合国在墨西哥坦坤举行的气候大会上，气候代表都同意泥炭湿地"恢复湿润"，这种做法可以让有些国家不需要通过其它手段就可以达到京都议定书及其它相关协议关于二氧化碳减排的要求，因而难免有些难登大雅之堂。

　　Guidelines for doing so will now be developed. But for these to have any practical effect, a final agreement will be needed over how more general changes in land use will be treated within any new climate deal. The next global climate gathering, in South Africa in December 2011, will attempt to arrive at one.

　　关于这项措施的指导方法正在制定中。不过要想产生任何实际效果，又有多少土地使用将会在其它新的气候合约中被纠正，还需要一个最终协议。下一次全球气候聚会将于2011年12月在南非举办，人们希望至少能达成一项协议。

　　As Susanna Tol of Wetlands International, an environmental lobby group, observes, only a portion of the world's wetlands will eventually be rewetted. Exactly which bits are restored to pristine sogginess will depend on local questions, such as the availability of land, the alternative uses for drained peatland and the price of carbon-dioxide offsets.

　　国际湿地组织（一个环境游说团体）的Susanna Tol指出，全世界只有部分湿地将最终被"恢复湿润"。究竟是哪些部分将被恢复到原始湿地状态取决于当地的一些问题，比如土地供应，排干的泥炭湿地的其它用途，以及降低二氧化碳排放的成本等。

　　In poor and boggy Belarus, for example, Ms Tol says it costs a mere