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Freshwater flocculation of suspended sediments in the Yangtze River, China

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Abstract

This study focuses on suspended sediments and in situ flocculation in the Yangtze River, with the goal of improving our understanding of the relationship between freshwater and estuarine flocculation. A field survey with state-of-the-art instruments was carried out in January 2008 in the reach from downstream of the Three Gorges Dam to the estuary. The data show that in situ floc mean diameters range from 22 to 182 μm in the river, whereas the median dispersed grain sizes are 4.4–11.4 μm. This demonstrates that flocculation is an important process during the transport of suspended sediments along the river. The flocculation characteristics, suspended sediment concentration and dispersed grain sizes all vary longitudinally in the main stream of the Yangtze River. Biochemical factors are likely be more significant in the freshwater flocculation than in the estuary, where hydrodynamics and biochemical factors are both important. Flocculation is found in the freshwater river, in the estuary and in coastal waters, which indicates that dynamic break-up/reflocculation processes take place during the suspended sediment transport. The freshwater flocs may behave as parent flocs to the estuarine flocculation. This study enhances our understanding of flocculation from estuarine and coastal areas to fresh river systems and provides insights into the effects of input of riverine flocs to the estuarine flocculation and into the sources and fate of flocs.

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Acknowledgments

This research was funded by Creative Research Groups of China (Grant No. 40721004) and the Sino-Dutch Program (Grant No. 2008DFB90240). We thank all the group members who participated in the field surveys (sometimes under extremely bad weather conditions) for their contributions. The authors would also like to thank Dr. Jian Shen (VIMS) for his constructive comments. The two reviewers and Dr. J.C. Winterwerp and Prof. Dano Roelvink are acknowledged for their constructive comments. Part of this work was presented at the 10th International Conference on Cohesive Sediment Transport Processes, May 3–8, 2009, Rio de Janeiro, BR. The fund (No. B08022), which sponsored the trip, is also acknowledged.

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  1. State Key Laboratory of Estuarine and Coastal Research, East China Normal University, Shanghai, 200062, People’s Republic of China

    Leicheng Guo & Qing He

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  1. Leicheng Guo
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  2. Qing He
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Correspondence to Qing He.

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Responsible Editor: Han Winterwerp

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Guo, L., He, Q. Freshwater flocculation of suspended sediments in the Yangtze River, China. Ocean Dynamics 61, 371–386 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10236-011-0391-x

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