Ashden Awards: Wild Haweswater, rewilding in the Lake District

Meet Wild Haweswater - winner of the 2024 Ashden Award for Nature Based Solutions.
The Wild Haweswater project shows how restoring landscapes can tackle extreme weather threats while creating new, sustainable jobs.
Run by wildlife charity RSPB and water firm United Utilities, the scheme is nourishing damaged hillsides, waterways and peatlands in the Lake District. Before work began, the Haweswater site was struggling to slow the flow of water downstream - while damage to peatland left it emitting CO2, rather than capturing it.
The project has ‘rewiggled’ Haweswater’s rivers and connected them to local floodplains, so that water stays upstream for longer. Over 200,000 trees have been planted, and peat bogs restored. Livestock grazing has been reduced. The scheme has created jobs and opportunities in sustainable farming and tourism. Local wildlife - from tree pipits to Atlantic Salmon - is benefiting too.
#rewilding #rspb #peat