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Fluvial organic carbon cycling regulated by sediment transit time and mineral protection

Repasch, Marisa; Scheingross, Joel S.; Hovius, Niels; Lupker, Maarten; Wittmann, Hella; Haghipour, Negar; Gröcke, Darren R.; Orfeo, Oscar; Eglinton, Timothy I.; Sachse, Dirk

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Authors

Marisa Repasch

Joel S. Scheingross

Niels Hovius

Maarten Lupker

Hella Wittmann

Negar Haghipour

Oscar Orfeo

Timothy I. Eglinton

Dirk Sachse



Abstract

Rivers transfer terrestrial organic carbon (OC) from mountains to ocean basins, playing a key role in the global carbon cycle. During fluvial transit, OC may be oxidized and emitted to the atmosphere as CO2 or preserved and transported to downstream depositional sinks. The balance between oxidation and preservation determines the amount of particulate OC (POC) that can be buried long term, but the factors regulating this balance are poorly constrained. Here, we quantify the effects of fluvial transit on POC fluxes along an ~1,300 km lowland channel with no tributaries. We show that sediment transit time and mineral protection regulate the magnitude and rate of POC oxidation, respectively. Using a simple turnover model, we estimate that annual POC oxidation is a small percentage of the POC delivered to the river. Modelling shows that lateral erosion into POC-rich floodplains can increase POC fluxes to downstream basins, thereby offsetting POC oxidation. Consequently, rivers with high channel mobility can enhance CO2 drawdown while management practices that stabilize river channels may reduce the potential for CO2 drawdown.

Citation

Repasch, M., Scheingross, J. S., Hovius, N., Lupker, M., Wittmann, H., Haghipour, N., …Sachse, D. (2021). Fluvial organic carbon cycling regulated by sediment transit time and mineral protection. Nature Geoscience, 14(11), 842-848. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-021-00845-7

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Sep 21, 2021
Online Publication Date Oct 28, 2021
Publication Date 2021-11
Deposit Date Dec 17, 2021
Publicly Available Date Jan 10, 2022
Journal Nature Geoscience
Print ISSN 1752-0894
Electronic ISSN 1752-0908
Publisher Nature Research
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 14
Issue 11
Pages 842-848
DOI https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-021-00845-7

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http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Copyright Statement
Open Access. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.





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