http://www.tinread.usarb.md:8888/tinread/fulltext/lal/erosion.pdf

Soil Erosion and the Global Carbon Budget

Streams, rivers, lakes, and other inland waters are important agents in the coupling of biogeochemical cycles between continents, atmosphere, and oceans. The depiction of these roles in global-scale assessments of carbon (C) and other bioactive elements remains limited, yet recent findings suggest that C discharged to the oceans is only a fraction of that entering rivers from terrestrial ecosystems via soil respiration, leaching, chemical weathering, and physical erosion. Most of this C influx is returned to the atmosphere from inland waters as carbon dioxide (CO2) or buried in sedimentary deposits within impoundments, lakes, floodplains, and other wetlands. Carbon and mineral cycles are coupled by both erosion–deposition processes and chemical weathering, with the latter producing dissolved inorganic C and carbonate buffering capacity that strongly modulate downstream pH, biological production of calcium-carbonate shells, and CO2 outgassing in rivers, estuaries, and coastal zones. Human activities substantially affect all of these processes.

/pdf/riverine-coupling-of-biogeochemical-cycles-between-land-3f8mvr7f8p.pdf

Riverine coupling of biogeochemical cycles between land, oceans, and atmosphere

results in a conservative estimate of 218 ± 72 Tg C a 1 . When using the best available estimates of various carbon sinks (organic carbon export, sediment burial, and mineralization), it appears that >50% of the carbon fixed by mangrove vegetation is unaccounted for. This unaccounted carbon sink is conservatively estimated at 112 ± 85 Tg C a 1 , equivalent in magnitude to 30–40% of the global riverine organic carbon input to the coastal zone. Our analysis suggests that mineralization is severely underestimated, and that the majority of carbon export from mangroves to adjacent waters occurs as dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC). CO2 efflux from sediments and creek waters and tidal export of DIC appear to be the major sinks. These processes are quantitatively comparable in magnitude to the unaccounted carbon sink in current budgets, but are not yet adequately constrained with the limited published data available so far.

/pdf/mangrove-production-and-carbon-sinks-a-revision-of-global-3ssso8s5i8.pdf

Mangrove Production and Carbon sinks: A revision of global budget estimates

The burial of organic matter (OM) in marine sediments represents the major link between “active” surface pools of carbon in the oceans, atmosphere, on land, and in marine sediment, and carbon pools that cycle on much longer, geologic time scales (i.e., carbon in sedimentary rock, coal, and petroleum deposits). It also plays some role in controlling atmospheric CO2 and O2 on these long time scales because in a highly simplified fashion OM burial in sediments can be thought of in terms of the balance between primary production and respiration on land and in the oceans.

Preservation of organic matter in marine sediments: controls, mechanisms, and an imbalance in sediment organic carbon budgets?

/pdf/mangrove-production-and-carbon-sinks-a-revision-of-global-1bp8rlyclg.pdf

Mangrove production and carbon sinks : a revision of global budget estimates - art. no. GB2013

This study re-estimates one important component in the global carbon cycle: the modern global fluviatile organic carbon discharge- and burial rates. According to these results, approximately 430×1012 g of terrestrial organic carbon are transported to the ocean in modern times. This amount is higher than the latest estimates but takes into account new data from Oceania not previously considered in global flux studies. However, only the minor amount of 10% or approximately 43×1012 gC year–1 is most likely buried in marine sediments. This amount is similar to the burial of marine organic carbon in the coastal ocean (55×1012 gC year–1). Adding both estimates gives approximately 100×1012 gC year–1, which is the value calculated by Berner (1982) for "terrestrial" deltaic-shelf sediments. However, the results in this study suggest that on a global scale the organic carbon content in coastal ocean sediments is not solely of terrestrial origin but a mixture of nearly equal amounts of marine and terrestrial organic carbon. The major part of the terrestrial organic carbon that enters the ocean by rivers (approximately 400×1012 gC year–1) seems to be either (a) remineralised in the ocean, whereas the mechanism by which the terrestrial organic carbon is oxidised in the ocean are unknown; or (b) is dispersed throughout the oceans and accumulates in pelagic sediments.

B. Schlünz

Papers

Transport of terrestrial organic carbon to the oceans by rivers: re-estimating flux- and burial rates