Scientists representing seven LTER sites, five countries, and two federal agencies participated in a program to examine continental scale patterns in the role of surface waters in landscape-scale carbon dynamics. The CO₂ project, which included a summer field data collection program at sites worldwide, had three major objectives:

1) Identify the continental-scale patterns in CO₂ saturation and compare the relative importance of terrestrial carbon inputs to lakes and streams in arctic, temperate and sub-tropical environments

2) Begin to determine at the landscape scale how specific processes, such as hydrologic inputs or carbon uptake by primary producers, relate to observed variation of CO₂ saturation in neighboring or interconnected lakes and streams

3) Evaluate, using long-term data records of CO₂ saturation, the magnitude of change over time in the relative importance of land-water linkages

Related Publications:

Cole, J. J. and N. F. Caraco. 1998. Atmospheric exchange of carbon dioxide
in a low-wind oligotrophic lake. Limnol. Oceanogr 43:647:656

Cole, J. J., N. F. Caraco, G. W. Kling, and T. K. Kratz. 1994. Carbon
dioxide supersaturation in the surface waters of lakes. Science 265:1568-1570.

Hope, D., T. K. Kratz, and J. L. Riera. 1996. The relationship between
PCO2 and dissolved organic carbon in the surface waters of 27 northern
Wisconsin lakes. Journal of Environmental Quality 49:1442-1445.

Kratz, T.K., J. Schindler, D. Hope, J. L. Riera, and C. J.
Bowser. 1997. Average annual carbon dioxide concentrations in eight
neighboring lakes in northern Wisconsin, USA. Verh. Internat. Verein.
Limnol. 26:335-338.

Raymond, P. A., N. F. Caraco and J. J. Cole. 1997. CO2 concentration and
atmospheric flux in the Hudson River. Estuaries 20:381:390

 

Riera, J. L., J. E. Schindler, and T. K. Kratz. 1999. Seasonal dynamics
of carbon dioxide and methane in two clear-water and two bog lakes in
northern Wisconsin, USA. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic
Sciences 56:265-274.

 

Schindler, D. E., S. R. Carpenter, J. J. Cole, J. F. Kitchell and M. L.
Pace. 1997. Influence of food web structure on carbon exchange between
lakes and the atmosphere. Science 277:248-251.

 

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For more information:
Tim Kratz
tkratz@lternet.edu
715/356-9494