Because freshwater covers such a small fraction of the Earth’s surface area, inland freshwater ecosystems (particularly lakes, rivers, and reservoirs) have rarely been considered as potentially important quantitative components of the carbon cycle at either global or regional scales. By taking published estimates of gas exchange, sediment accumulation, and carbon transport for a variety of aquatic systems, we have constructed a budget for the role of inland water ecosystems in the global carbon cycle. Our analysis conservatively estimates that inland waters annually receive, from a combination of background and anthropogenically altered sources, on the order of 1.9 Pg C y−1 from the terrestrial landscape, of which about 0.2 is buried in aquatic sediments, at least 0.8 (possibly much more) is returned to the atmosphere as gas exchange while the remaining 0.9 Pg y−1 is delivered to the oceans, roughly equally as inorganic and organic carbon. Thus, roughly twice as much C enters inland aquatic systems from land as is exported from land to the sea. Over prolonged time net carbon fluxes in aquatic systems tend to be greater per unit area than in much of the surrounding land. Although their area is small, these freshwater aquatic systems can affect regional C balances. Further, the inclusion of inland, freshwater ecosystems provides useful insight about the storage, oxidation and transport of terrestrial C, and may warrant a revision of how the modern net C sink on land is described.

/pdf/plumbing-the-global-carbon-cycle-integrating-inland-waters-1enndt5kqx.pdf

Plumbing the Global Carbon Cycle: Integrating Inland Waters into the Terrestrial Carbon Budget

We explore the role of lakes in carbon cycling and global climate, examine the mechanisms influencing carbon pools and transformations in lakes, and discuss how the metabolism of carbon in the inland waters is likely to change in response to climate. Furthermore, we project changes as global climate change in the abundance and spatial distribution of lakes in the biosphere, and we revise the estimate for the global extent of carbon transformation in inland waters. This synthesis demonstrates that the global annual emissions of carbon dioxide from inland waters to the atmosphere are similar in magnitude to the carbon dioxide uptake by the oceans and that the global burial of organic carbon in inland water sediments exceeds organic carbon sequestration on the ocean floor. The role of inland waters in global carbon cycling and climate forcing may be changed by human activities, including construction of impoundments, which accumulate large amounts of carbon in sediments and emit large amounts of methane to the atmosphere. Methane emissions are also expected from lakes on melting permafrost. The synthesis presented here indicates that (1) inland waters constitute a significant component of the global carbon cycle, (2) their contribution to this cycle has significantly changed as a result of human activities, and (3) they will continue to change in response to future climate change causing decreased as well as increased abundance of lakes as well as increases in the number of aquatic impoundments.

/pdf/lakes-and-reservoirs-as-regulators-of-carbon-cycling-and-1nvh2w013k.pdf

Lakes and reservoirs as regulators of carbon cycling and climate

The terrestrial biosphere is assumed to take up most of the carbon on land. However, it is becoming clear that inland waters process large amounts of organic carbon and must be considered in strategies to mitigate climate change.

The boundless carbon cycle

An accurate description of the abundance and size distribution of lakes is critical to quantifying limnetic contributions to the global carbon cycle. However, estimates of global lake abundance are ...

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/2014GL060641

A global inventory of lakes based on high‐resolution satellite imagery

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 a ...

/pdf/temperature-controlled-organic-carbon-mineralization-in-lake-5ggr2fq7xf.pdf

Temperature-controlled organic carbon mineralization in lake sediments

Atmospheric carbon burial in modern lake basins and its significance for the global carbon budget

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Atmospheric carbon burial in modern lake basins and its significance for the global carbon budget