University of Cambridge

More fires, taking hold over more months of the year, are causing more carbon to be released into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide. Fires on peatlands, which are carbon-rich, can almost double global fire-driven carbon emissions. Researchers found that despite accounting for only a quarter of the total UK land area that burns each year, dwarfed by moor and heathland, wildfires that burn peat have caused up to 90% of annual UK fire-driven carbon emissions since 2001 – with emissions spikes in particularly dry years. Peat only burns when it’s hot and dry enough - conditions that are occurring more often with climate change. The peatlands of Saddleworth Moor in the Peak District, and Flow Country in northern Scotland, have both been affected by huge wildfires in recent years. Unlike heather moorland which takes up to twenty years to regrow after a fire, burnt peat can take centuries to reaccumulate. The loss of this valuable carbon store makes the increasing wildfire frequency on peatlands a real cause for concern.  The researchers also calculated that carbon emissions from fires on UK peatland are likely to rise by at least 60% if the planet warms by 2oC.  The findings, which are broadly relevant to peatlands in temperate climates, are published today in the journal 'Environmental Research Letters'. “We found that peatland fires are responsible for a disproportionately large amount of the carbon emissions caused by UK wildfires, which we project will increase even more with climate change,” said Dr Adam Pellegrini in the University of Cambridge’s Department of Plant Sciences, senior author of the study. He added: “Peatland reaccumulates lost carbon so slowly as it recovers after a wildfire that this process is limited for climate change mitigation. We need to focus on preventing that peat from burning in the first place, by re-wetting peatlands.” "We found that in dry years, peatland wildfires were able to burn into the peat and release significant quantities of carbon into the atmosphere. In particularly dry years this contributed up to 90% of the total wildfire-driven carbon emissions from the UK," said Dr Sarah Baker, lead author of the study which she conducted while at the University of Cambridge. Baker is now based at the University of Exeter. The researchers found that the UK’s ‘fire season’ - when fires occur on natural land - has lengthened dramatically since 2011, from between one and four months in the years 2011-2016 to between six and nine months in the years 2017-2021. The change is particularly marked in Scotland, where almost half of all UK fires occur. Nine percent of the UK is covered by peatland, which in a healthy condition removes over three million tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere per year.  The researchers estimate 800,000 tonnes of carbon were emitted from fires on UK peatlands between 2001 and 2021. The 2018 Saddleworth Moor fire emitted 24,000 tonnes of carbon, and the 2019 Flow Country fire emitted 96,000 tonnes of carbon from burning peat. To get their results, the researchers mapped all UK wildfires over a period of 20 years – assessing where they burn, whether peat burned, how much carbon they emit, and how climate change is affecting fires. This involved combining data on fire locations, vegetation type and carbon content, soil moisture, and peat depth. Using UK Met Office model outputs, the team also used simulated climate conditions to project how wildfires in the UK could change in the future. The study only considered land where wildfires have occurred in the past, and did not consider the future increases in burned area that are likely to occur with hotter, drier UK summers. An average of 5,600 hectares of moor and heathland burns across the UK each year, compared to 2,500 hectares of peatland. “Buffering the UK’s peatlands against really hot, dry summers is a great way to reduce carbon emissions as part of our goal to reach net zero. Humans are capable of incredible things when we’re incentivised to do them,” said Pellegrini. The research was funded by Wellcome, the Isaac Newton Trust and UKRI. Reference: Baker, S J et al: ‘Spikes in UK wildfire emissions driven by peatland fires in dry years.’ February 2025, Environmental Research Letters. DOI: 10.1088/1748-9326/adafc6.   A new study led by the University of Cambridge has revealed that as our springs and summers get hotter and drier, the UK wildfire season is being stretched and intensified. Peatland fires are responsible for a disproportionately large amount of the carbon emissions caused by UK wildfires, which we project will increase even more with climate changeAdam PellegriniSarah BakerFire on UK moorland The text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright ©University of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms. YesLicence type: Attribution-Noncommerical

More fires, taking hold over more months of the year, are causing more carbon to be released into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide. Fires on peatlands, which are carbon-rich, can almost double global fire-driven carbon emissions. Researchers found that despite accounting for only a quarter of the total UK land area that burns each year, dwarfed by moor and heathland, wildfires that burn peat have caused up to 90% of annual UK fire-driven carbon emissions since 2001 – with emissions spikes in particularly dry years. Peat only burns when it’s hot and dry enough - conditions that are occurring more often with climate change. The peatlands of Saddleworth Moor in the Peak District, and Flow Country in northern Scotland, have both been affected by huge wildfires in recent years. Unlike heather moorland which takes up to twenty years to regrow after a fire, burnt peat can take centuries to reaccumulate. The loss of this valuable carbon store makes the increasing wildfire frequency on peatlands a real cause for concern.  The researchers also calculated that carbon emissions from fires on UK peatland are likely to rise by at least 60% if the planet warms by 2oC.  The findings, which are broadly relevant to peatlands in temperate climates, are published today in the journal 'Environmental Research Letters'. “We found that peatland fires are responsible for a disproportionately large amount of the carbon emissions caused by UK wildfires, which we project will increase even more with climate change,” said Dr Adam Pellegrini in the University of Cambridge’s Department of Plant Sciences, senior author of the study. He added: “Peatland reaccumulates lost carbon so slowly as it recovers after a wildfire that this process is limited for climate change mitigation. We need to focus on preventing that peat from burning in the first place, by re-wetting peatlands.” "We found that in dry years, peatland wildfires were able to burn into the peat and release significant quantities of carbon into the atmosphere. In particularly dry years this contributed up to 90% of the total wildfire-driven carbon emissions from the UK," said Dr Sarah Baker, lead author of the study which she conducted while at the University of Cambridge. Baker is now based at the University of Exeter. The researchers found that the UK’s ‘fire season’ - when fires occur on natural land - has lengthened dramatically since 2011, from between one and four months in the years 2011-2016 to between six and nine months in the years 2017-2021. The change is particularly marked in Scotland, where almost half of all UK fires occur. Nine percent of the UK is covered by peatland, which in a healthy condition removes over three million tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere per year.  The researchers estimate 800,000 tonnes of carbon were emitted from fires on UK peatlands between 2001 and 2021. The 2018 Saddleworth Moor fire emitted 24,000 tonnes of carbon, and the 2019 Flow Country fire emitted 96,000 tonnes of carbon from burning peat. To get their results, the researchers mapped all UK wildfires over a period of 20 years – assessing where they burn, whether peat burned, how much carbon they emit, and how climate change is affecting fires. This involved combining data on fire locations, vegetation type and carbon content, soil moisture, and peat depth. Using UK Met Office model outputs, the team also used simulated climate conditions to project how wildfires in the UK could change in the future. The study only considered land where wildfires have occurred in the past, and did not consider the future increases in burned area that are likely to occur with hotter, drier UK summers. An average of 5,600 hectares of moor and heathland burns across the UK each year, compared to 2,500 hectares of peatland. “Buffering the UK’s peatlands against really hot, dry summers is a great way to reduce carbon emissions as part of our goal to reach net zero. Humans are capable of incredible things when we’re incentivised to do them,” said Pellegrini. The research was funded by Wellcome, the Isaac Newton Trust and UKRI. Reference: Baker, S.J. et al: ‘Spikes in UK wildfire emissions driven by peatland fires in dry years.’ February 2025, Environmental Research Letters. DOI: 10.1088/1748-9326/adafc6.   A new study led by the University of Cambridge has revealed that as our springs and summers get hotter and drier, the UK wildfire season is being stretched and intensified. Peatland fires are responsible for a disproportionately large amount of the carbon emissions caused by UK wildfires, which we project will increase even more with climate changeAdam PellegriniSarah BakerFire on UK moorland The text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright ©University of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms. YesLicence type: Attribution-Noncommerical

The UK government should resist allowing AI companies to scrape all copyrighted works unless the holder has actively ‘opted out’, as it puts an unfair burden on up-and-coming creative talents who lack the skills and resources to meet legal requirements. This is according to a new report from University of Cambridge experts in economics, policy and machine learning, who also argue the UK government should clearly state that only a human author can hold copyright – even when AI has been heavily involved. A collaboration between three Cambridge initiatives – the Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy, the Bennett Institute for Public Policy, and ai@cam – the report argues that unregulated use of generative AI will not guarantee economic growth, and risks damaging the UK’s thriving creative sector.  If the UK adopts the proposed ‘rights reservation’ for AI data mining, rather than maintaining the legal foundation that automatically safeguards copyright, it will compromise the livelihoods of many in the sector, particularly those just starting out, say researchers. They argue that it risks allowing artistic content produced in the UK to be scraped for endless reuse by offshore companies. “Going the way of an opt-out model is telling Britain’s artists, musicians, and writers that tech industry profitability is more valuable than their creations,” said Prof Gina Neff, Executive Director at the Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy. “Ambitions to strengthen the creative sector, bolster the British economy and spark innovation using GenAI in the UK can be achieved – but we will only get results that benefit all of us if we put people’s needs before tech companies.” 'Ingested' by technologies Creative industries contribute around £124.6 billion or 5.7% to the UK’s economy, and have a deep connection to the tech industry. For example, the UK video games industry is the largest in Europe, and contributed £5.12 billion to the UK economy in 2019. While AI could lead to a new generation of creative companies and products, the researchers say that little is currently known about how AI is being adopted within these industries, and where the skills gaps lie. “The Government ought to commission research that engages directly with creatives, understanding where and how AI is benefiting and harming them, and use it to inform policies for supporting the sector’s workforce,” said Neil Lawrence, DeepMind Professor of Machine Learning and Chair of ai@cam. “Uncertainty about copyright infringement is hindering the development of Generative AI for public benefit in the UK. For AI to be trusted and widely deployed, it should not make creative work more difficult.” In the UK, copyright is vested in the creator automatically if it meets the legal criteria. Some AI companies have tried to exploit ‘fair dealing’ – a loophole based around use for research or reporting – but this is undermined by the commercial nature of most AI. Now, some AI companies are brokering licensing agreements with publishers, and the report argues this is a potential way to ensure creative industries are compensated. While rights of performers, from singers to actors, currently cover reproductions of live performances, AI uses composites harvested from across a performer’s oeuvre, so rights relating to specific performances are unlikely to apply, say researchers. Further clauses in older contracts mean performers are having their work ‘ingested’ by technologies that didn’t exist when they signed on the dotted line. The researchers call on the government to fully adopt the Beijing Treaty on Audio Visual Performance, which the UK signed over a decade ago but is yet to implement, as it gives performers economic rights over all reproduction, distribution and rental. "The current lack of clarity about the licensing and regulation of training data use is a lose-lose situation. Creative professionals aren't fairly compensated for their work being used to train AI models, while AI companies are hesitant to fully invest in the UK due to unclear legal frameworks,” said Prof Diane Coyle, the Bennett Professor of Public Policy. “We propose mandatory transparency requirements for AI training data and standardised licensing agreements that properly value creative works. Without these guardrails, we risk undermining our valuable creative sector in the pursuit of uncertain benefits from AI." 'Spirit of copyright law' The Cambridge experts also look at questions of copyright for AI-generated work, and the extent to which ‘prompting’ AI can constitute ownership. They conclude that AI cannot itself hold copyright, and the UK government should develop guidelines on compensation for artists whose work and name feature in prompts instructing AI. When it comes to the proposed ‘opt-out’ solution, the experts it is not “in the spirit of copyright law” and is difficult to enforce. Even if creators do opt out, it is not clear how that data will be identified, labelled, and compensated, or even erased. It may be seen as giving ‘carte blanche’ to foreign-owned and managed AI companies to benefit from British copyrighted works without a clear mechanism for creators to receive fair compensation. “Asking copyright reform to solve structural problems with AI is not the solution,” said Dr Ann Kristin Glenster, Senior Policy Advisor at the Minderoo Centre for Technology and lead author of the report. “Our research shows that the business case has yet to be made for an opt-out regime that will promote growth and innovation of the UK creative industries. “Devising policies that enable the UK creative industries to benefit from AI should be the Government’s priority if it wants to see growth of both its creative and tech industries,” Glenster said. The UK government’s proposed ‘rights reservation’ model for AI data mining tells British artists, musicians, and writers that “tech industry profitability is more valuable than their creations” say leading academics. We will only get results that benefit all of us if we put people’s needs before tech companiesGina NeffKal Visuals - Unsplash The text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright ©University of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms. YesLicence type: Attribution

The UK government should resist allowing AI companies to scrape all copyrighted works unless the holder has actively “opted out”, as it puts an unfair burden on up-and-coming creative talents who lack the skills and resources to meet legal requirements. This is according to a new report from University of Cambridge experts in economics, policy and machine learning, who also argue the UK government should clearly state that only a human author can hold copyright – even when AI has been heavily involved. A collaboration between three Cambridge initiatives – the Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy, the Bennett Institute for Public Policy, and ai@cam – the report argues that unregulated use of generative AI will not guarantee economic growth, and risks damaging the UK’s thriving creative sector.  If the UK adopts the proposed ‘rights reservation’ for AI data mining, rather than maintaining the legal foundation that automatically safeguards copyright, it will compromise the livelihoods of many in the sector, particularly those just starting out, say researchers. They argue that it risks allowing artistic content produced in the UK to be scraped for endless reuse by offshore companies. “Going the way of an opt-out model is telling Britain’s artists, musicians, and writers that tech industry profitability is more valuable than their creations,” said Prof Gina Neff, Executive Director at the Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy. “Ambitions to strengthen the creative sector, bolster the British economy and spark innovation using GenAI in the UK can be achieved – but we will only get results that benefit all of us if we put people’s needs before tech companies.” 'Ingested' by technologies Creative industries contribute around £124.6 billion or 5.7% to the UK’s economy, and have a deep connection to the tech industry. For example, the UK video games industry is the largest in Europe, and contributed £5.12 billion to the UK economy in 2019. While AI could lead to a new generation of creative companies and products, the researchers say that little is currently known about how AI is being adopted within these industries, and where the skills gaps lie. “The Government ought to commission research that engages directly with creatives, understanding where and how AI is benefiting and harming them, and use it to inform policies for supporting the sector’s workforce,” said Neil Lawrence, DeepMind Professor of Machine Learning and Chair of ai@cam. “Uncertainty about copyright infringement is hindering the development of Generative AI for public benefit in the UK. For AI to be trusted and widely deployed, it should not make creative work more difficult.” In the UK, copyright is vested in the creator automatically if it meets the legal criteria. Some AI companies have tried to exploit “fair dealing” – a loophole based around use for research or reporting – but this is undermined by the commercial nature of most AI. Now, some AI companies are brokering licensing agreements with publishers, and the report argues this is a potential way to ensure creative industries are compensated. While rights of performers, from singers to actors, currently cover reproductions of live performances, AI uses composites harvested from across a performer’s oeuvre, so rights relating to specific performances are unlikely to apply, say researchers. Further clauses in older contracts mean performers are having their work “ingested” by technologies that didn’t exist when they signed on the dotted line. The researchers call on the government to fully adopt the Beijing Treaty on Audio Visual Performance, which the UK signed over a decade ago but is yet to implement, as it gives performers economic rights over all reproduction, distribution and rental. "The current lack of clarity about the licensing and regulation of training data use is a lose-lose situation. Creative professionals aren't fairly compensated for their work being used to train AI models, while AI companies are hesitant to fully invest in the UK due to unclear legal frameworks,” said Prof Diane Coyle, the Bennett Professor of Public Policy. “We propose mandatory transparency requirements for AI training data and standardised licensing agreements that properly value creative works. Without these guardrails, we risk undermining our valuable creative sector in the pursuit of uncertain benefits from AI." 'Spirit of copyright law' The Cambridge experts also look at questions of copyright for AI-generated work, and the extent to which “prompting” AI can constitute ownership. They conclude that AI cannot itself hold copyright, and the UK government should develop guidelines on compensation for artists whose work and name feature in prompts instructing AI. When it comes to the proposed ‘opt-out’ solution, the experts it is not “in the spirit of copyright law” and is difficult to enforce. Even if creators do opt out, it is not clear how that data will be identified, labelled, and compensated, or even erased. It may be seen as giving “carte blanche” to foreign-owned and managed AI companies to benefit from British copyrighted works without a clear mechanism for creators to receive fair compensation. “Asking copyright reform to solve structural problems with AI is not the solution,” said Dr Ann Kristin Glenster, Senior Policy Advisor at the Minderoo Centre for Technology and lead author of the report. “Our research shows that the business case has yet to be made for an opt-out regime that will promote growth and innovation of the UK creative industries. “Devising policies that enable the UK creative industries to benefit from AI should be the Government’s priority if it wants to see growth of both its creative and tech industries,” Glenster said. The UK government’s proposed ‘rights reservation’ model for AI data mining tells British artists, musicians, and writers that “tech industry profitability is more valuable than their creations” say leading academics. We will only get results that benefit all of us if we put people’s needs before tech companiesGina NeffKal Visuals - Unsplash The text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright ©University of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms. YesLicence type: Attribution