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Data for Cleaner air reveals growing influence of climate on dissolved organic carbon trends

Metadata Updated: March 17, 2022

Surface water browning, the result of increasing concentrations of dissolved organic matter (DOM), has been widespread in northern ecosystems in recent decades. Here, we assess a database of 426 undisturbed headwater lakes and streams in Europe and North America for evidence of trends in DOM between 1990 and 2016. We describe contrasting changes in DOM trends in Europe (decelerating) and North America (accelerating), which are consistent with organic matter solubility responses to declines in sulfate deposition. While earlier trends (1990–2004) were almost entirely related to changes in atmospheric chemistry, climatic and chemical drivers were equally important in explaining recent DOM trends (2002–2016). We estimate that riverine DOM export from northern ecosystems increased by 27% during the study period. Increased summer precipitation strengthened upward dissolved organic carbon trends while warming apparently damped browning. Our results suggest strong but changing influences of air quality and climate on the terrestrial carbon cycle, and on the magnitude of carbon export from land to water.

This dataset is associated with the following publication: de Wit, H., J. Stoddard, D. Monteith, J. Sample, K. Austnes, S. Couture, J. Fölster, S. Higgins, D. Houle, J. Hruška, P. Krám, J. Kopáček, A. Paterson, S. Valinia, H. van Dam, J. Vuorenmaa, and C. Evans. Cleaner air reveals growing influence of climate on dissolved organic carbon trends in northern headwaters. Environmental Research Letters. IOP Publishing LIMITED, Bristol, UK, 16(10): 104009, (2021).

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: See this page for license information.

Downloads & Resources

References

https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ac2526

Dates

Metadata Created Date March 17, 2022
Metadata Updated Date March 17, 2022

Metadata Source

Harvested from EPA ScienceHub

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date March 17, 2022
Metadata Updated Date March 17, 2022
Publisher U.S. EPA Office of Research and Development (ORD)
Maintainer
Identifier https://doi.org/10.23719/1518364
Data Last Modified 2019-01-31
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 020:00
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Data Dictionary https://pasteur.epa.gov/uploads/10.23719/1518364/documents/Data%20Dictionary.csv
Data Dictionary Type text/csv
Harvest Object Id 1792cba0-4fcd-4ff7-857a-9068932412da
Harvest Source Id 04b59eaf-ae53-4066-93db-80f2ed0df446
Harvest Source Title EPA ScienceHub
License https://pasteur.epa.gov/license/sciencehub-license.html
Program Code 020:000
Publisher Hierarchy U.S. Government > U.S. Environmental Protection Agency > U.S. EPA Office of Research and Development (ORD)
Related Documents https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ac2526
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash 9b946f523778e12e4404acf6a5eb431b11ce468c
Source Schema Version 1.1

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