David Bastviken

Freshwater Methane Emissions Offset the Continental Carbon Sink

Inland freshwaters, which include lakes, reservoirs, streams, and rivers, may emit far more methane than previously thought. Inland waters (lakes, reservoirs, streams, and rivers) are often substantial methane (CH4) sources in the terrestrial landscape. They are, however, not yet well integrated in global greenhouse gas (GHG) budgets. Data from 474 freshwater ecosystems and the most recent global water area estimates indicate that freshwaters emit at least 103 teragrams of CH4 year−1, corresponding to 0.65 petagrams of C as carbon dioxide (CO2) equivalents year−1, offsetting 25% of the estimated land carbon sink. Thus, the continental GHG sink may be considerably overestimated, and freshwaters need to be recognized as important in the global carbon cycle.

Whole-lake carbon-13 additions reveal terrestrial support of aquatic food webs

Ecosystems are supported by organic carbon from two distinct sources. Endogenous carbon is produced by photosynthesis within an ecosystem by autotrophic organisms. Exogenous carbon is produced elsewhere and transported into ecosystems. Consumers may use exogenous carbon with consequent influences on population dynamics, predator–prey relationships and ecosystem processes. For example, exogenous inputs provide resources that may enhance consumer abundance beyond levels supported by within-system primary production. Exogenous fluxes of organic carbon to ecosystems are often large, but this material is recalcitrant and difficult to assimilate, in contrast to endogenously produced organic matter, which is used more easily. Here we show, by the experimental manipulation of dissolved inorganic 13C in two lakes, that internal primary production is insufficient to support the food webs of these ecosystems. Additions of NaH13CO3 enriched the 13C content of dissolved inorganic carbon, particulate organic carbon, zooplankton and fish. Dynamics of 13C indicate that 40–55% of particulate organic carbon and 22–50% of zooplankton carbon are derived from terrestrial sources, showing that there is significant subsidy of these ecosystems by organic carbon produced outside their boundaries.

ECOSYSTEM SUBSIDIES: TERRESTRIAL SUPPORT OF AQUATIC FOOD WEBS FROM 13C ADDITION TO CONTRASTING LAKES

Whole-lake additions of dissolved inorganic C-13 were used to measure allochthony (the terrestrial contribution of organic carbon to aquatic consumers) in two unproductive lakes (Paul and Peter Lakes in 2001), a nutrient-enriched lake (Peter Lake in 2002), and a dystrophic lake (Tuesday Lake in 2002). Three kinds of dynamic models were used to estimate allochthony: a process-rich, dual-isotope flow model based on mass balances of two carbon isotopes in 12 carbon pools; simple univariate time-series models driven by observed time courses of delta(13)CO(2); and multivariate autoregression models that combined information from time series of delta(13)C in several interacting carbon pools. All three models gave similar estimates of allochthony. In the three experiments without nutrient enrichment, flows of terrestrial carbon to dissolved and particulate organic carbon, zooplankton, Chaoborus, and fishes were substantial. For example, terrestrial sources accounted for more than half the carbon flow to juvenile and adult largemouth bass, pumpkinseed sunfish, golden shiners, brook sticklebacks, and fathead minnows in the unenriched experiments. Allochthony was highest in the dystrophic lake and lowest in the nutrient-enriched lake. Nutrient enrichment of Peter Lake decreased allochthony of zooplankton from 0.34-0.48 to 0-0.12, and of fishes from 0.51-0.80 to 0.25-0.55. These experiments show that lake ecosystem carbon cycles, including carbon flows to consumers, are heavily subsidized by organic carbon from the surrounding landscape.

Temperature-controlled organic carbon mineralization in lake sediments

Peatlands, soils and the ocean floor are well-recognized as sites of organic carbon accumulation and represent important global carbon sinks. Although the annual burial of organic carbon in lakes and reservoirs exceeds that of ocean sediments, these inland waters are components of the global carbon cycle that receive only limited attention. Of the organic carbon that is being deposited onto the sediments, a certain proportion will be mineralized and the remainder will be buried over geological timescales. Here we assess the relationship between sediment organic carbon mineralization and temperature in a cross-system survey of boreal lakes in Sweden, and with input from a compilation of published data from a wide range of lakes that differ with respect to climate, productivity and organic carbon source. We find that the mineralization of organic carbon in lake sediments exhibits a strongly positive relationship with temperature, which suggests that warmer water temperatures lead to more mineralization and less organic carbon burial. Assuming that future organic carbon delivery to the lake sediments will be similar to that under present-day conditions, we estimate that temperature increases following the latest scenarios presented by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change could result in a 4–27 per cent (0.9–6.4 Tg C yr−1) decrease in annual organic carbon burial in boreal lakes.

Methane fluxes show consistent temperature dependence across microbial to ecosystem scales

Methane (CH4) is an important greenhouse gas because it has 25 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide (CO2) by mass over a century. Recent calculations suggest that atmospheric CH4 emissions have been responsible for approximately 20% of Earth’s warming since pre-industrial times. Understanding how CH4 emissions from ecosystems will respond to expected increases in global temperature is therefore fundamental to predicting whether the carbon cycle will mitigate or accelerate climate change. Methanogenesis is the terminal step in the remineralization of organic matter and is carried out by strictly anaerobic Archaea. Like most other forms of metabolism, methanogenesis is temperature-dependent. However, it is not yet known how this physiological response combines with other biotic processes (for example, methanotrophy, substrate supply, microbial community composition) and abiotic processes (for example, water-table depth) to determine the temperature dependence of ecosystem-level CH4 emissions. It is also not known whether CH4 emissions at the ecosystem level have a fundamentally different temperature dependence than other key fluxes in the carbon cycle, such as photosynthesis and respiration. Here we use meta-analyses to show that seasonal variations in CH4 emissions from a wide range of ecosystems exhibit an average temperature dependence similar to that of CH4 production derived from pure cultures of methanogens and anaerobic microbial communities. This average temperature dependence (0.96 electron volts (eV)), which corresponds to a 57-fold increase between 0 and 30°C, is considerably higher than previously observed for respiration (approximately 0.65 eV) and photosynthesis (approximately 0.3 eV). As a result, we show that both the emission of CH4 and the ratio of CH4 to CO2 emissions increase markedly with seasonal increases in temperature. Our findings suggest that global warming may have a large impact on the relative contributions of CO2 and CH4 to total greenhouse gas emissions from aquatic ecosystems, terrestrial wetlands and rice paddies.

Fates of methane from different lake habitats : Connecting whole-lake budgets and CH4 emissions

Methane (CH4) represents a major product of organic matter decomposition in lakes. Once produced in the sediments, CH4 can be either oxidized or emitted as a greenhouse gas to the atmosphere. Lakes ...

METHANE AS A SOURCE OF CARBON AND ENERGY FOR LAKE PELAGIC FOOD WEBS

Water-column methane oxidation can represent a substantial carbon transformation pathway in lakes, and circumstantial evidence indicates that methane may be a potentially important source of carbon ...

Methane Emissions from Pantanal, South America, during the Low Water Season : Toward More Comprehensive Sampling

Freshwater environments contribute 75% of the natural global methane (CH(4)) emissions. While there are indications that tropical lakes and reservoirs emit 58-400% more CH(4) per unit area than similar environments in boreal and temperate biomes, direct measurements of tropical lake emissions are scarce. We measured CH(4) emissions from 16 natural shallow lakes in the Pantanal region of South America, one of the worlds largest tropical wetland areas, during the low water period using floating flux chambers. Measured fluxes ranged from 3.9 to 74.2 mmol m(-2) d(-1) with the average from all studied lakes being 8.8 mmol m(-2) d(-1) (131.8 mg CH(4) m(-2) d(-1)), of which ebullition accounted for 91% of the flux (28-98% on individual lakes). Diel cycling of emission rates was observed and therefore 24-h long measurements are recommended rather than short-term measurements not accounting for the full diel cycle. Methane emission variability within a lake may be equal to or more important than between lake variability in floodplain areas as this study identified diverse habitats within lakes having widely different flux rates. Future measurements with static floating chambers should be based on many individual chambers distributed in the various subenvironments of a lake that may differ in emissions in order to account for the within lake variability.

Abundance, Activity, and Community Structure of Pelagic Methane-Oxidizing Bacteria in Temperate Lakes

ABSTRACT The abundance and activity of methane-oxidizing bacteria (MOB) in the water column were investigated in three lakes with different contents of nutrients and humic substances. The abundance of MOB was determined by analysis of group-specific phospholipid fatty acids from type I and type II MOB, and in situ activity was measured with a 14CH4 transformation method. The fatty acid analyses indicated that type I MOB most similar to species of Methylomonas, Methylomicrobium, and Methylosarcina made a substantial contribution (up to 41%) to the total bacterial biomass, whereas fatty acids from type II MOB generally had very low concentrations. The MOB biomass and oxidation activity were positively correlated and were highest in the hypo- and metalimnion during summer stratification, whereas under ice during winter, maxima occurred close to the sediments. The methanotroph biomass-specific oxidation rate (V) ranged from 0.001 to 2.77 mg CH4-C mg−1 C day−1 and was positively correlated with methane concentration, suggesting that methane supply largely determined the activity and biomass distribution of MOB. Our results demonstrate that type I MOB often are a large component of pelagic bacterial communities in temperate lakes. They represent a potentially important pathway for reentry of carbon and energy into pelagic food webs that would otherwise be lost as evasion of CH4.

Bubbles trapped in arctic lake ice: Potential implications for methane emissions

The amount of methane (CH(4)) emitted from northern lakes to the atmosphere is uncertain but is expected to increase as a result of arctic warming. A majority of CH4 is thought to be released throu ...