Agricultural peatland restoration: effects of land‐use change on greenhouse gas (CO₂ and CH₄) fluxes in the Sacramento‐San Joaquin Delta

Abstract Agricultural drainage of organic soils has resulted in vast soil subsidence and contributed to increased atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) concentrations. The Sacramento‐San Joaquin Delta in California was drained over a century ago for agriculture and human settlement and has since experienced subsidence rates that are among the highest in the world. It is recognized that drained agriculture in the Delta is unsustainable in the long‐term, and to help reverse subsidence and capture carbon (C) there is an interest in restoring drained agricultural land‐use types to flooded conditions. However, flooding may increase methane (CH 4 ) emissions. We conducted a full year of simultaneous eddy covariance measurements at two conventional drained agricultural peatlands (a pasture and a corn field) and three flooded land‐use types (a rice paddy and two restored wetlands) to assess the impact of drained to flooded land‐use change on CO 2 and CH 4 fluxes in the Delta. We found that the drained sites were net C and greenhouse gas (GHG) sources, releasing up to 341 g C m −2 yr −1 as CO 2 and 11.4 g C m −2 yr −1 as CH 4 . Conversely, the restored wetlands were net sinks of atmospheric CO 2 , sequestering up to 397 g C m −2 yr −1 . However, they were large sources of CH 4 , with emissions ranging from 39 to 53 g C m −2 yr −1 . In terms of the full GHG budget, the restored wetlands could be either GHG sources or sinks. Although the rice paddy was a small atmospheric CO 2 sink, when considering harvest and CH 4 emissions, it acted as both a C and GHG source. Annual photosynthesis was similar between sites, but flooding at the restored sites inhibited ecosystem respiration, making them net CO 2 sinks. This study suggests that converting drained agricultural peat soils to flooded land‐use types can help reduce or reverse soil subsidence and reduce GHG emissions.