Let
$(S,\mathfrak{m})$ be an
$n$-dimensional regular local ring essentially of finite type over a field and let
$\mathfrak{a}$ be an ideal of
$S$. We prove that if
$\text{depth}\,S/\mathfrak{a}\geqslant 3$, then the cohomological dimension
$\text{cd}(S,\mathfrak{a})$ of
$\mathfrak{a}$ is less than or equal to
$n-3$. This settles a conjecture of Varbaro for such an
$S$. We also show, under the assumption that
$S$ has an algebraically closed residue field of characteristic zero, that if
$\text{depth}\,S/\mathfrak{a}\geqslant 4$, then
$\text{cd}(S,\mathfrak{a})\leqslant n-4$ if and only if the local Picard group of the completion
$\widehat{S/\mathfrak{a}}$ is torsion. We give a number of applications, including a vanishing result on Lyubeznik’s numbers, and sharp bounds on the cohomological dimension of ideals whose quotients satisfy good depth conditions such as Serre’s conditions
$(S_{i})$.