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Groundwater Carbon Exports Exceed Sediment Carbon Burial in a Salt Marsh

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Abstract

Salt marshes can sequester large amounts of carbon in sediments, but the relation between carbon storage and exportation remains poorly understood. Groundwater exchange can flush sediment carbon to surface waters and potentially reduce storage. In this study, we estimated groundwater fluxes and associated carbon fluxes using a radon (222Rn) mass balance and sediment carbon burial rates using lead (210Pb) in a pristine salt marsh (North Inlet, SC, USA). We used δ13C to trace carbon origins. We found that groundwater releases large amounts of carbon to the open ocean. These groundwater fluxes have the potential to export 7.2 ± 5.5 g m−2 of dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC), 0.2 ± 0.2 g m−2 of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) and 0.7 ± 0.5 g m−2 of carbon dioxide (CO2) per day. The fluxes exceed the average surface water CO2 emissions (0.6 ± 0.2 g m−2 day−1) and the average sediment carbon burial rates (0.17 ± 0.09 g m−2 day−1). The δ13C results suggest that groundwater carbon originated from salt marsh soils, while the sediment carbon source is derived from salt marsh vegetation. We propose that the impact of salt marshes in carbon cycling depends not only on their capacity to bury carbon in sediments, but also on their high potential to export carbon to the ocean via groundwater pathways.

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Acknowledgements

Additional support was provided by The University of South Carolina and the Belle W. Baruch Marine Research Institute Visiting Scientist Award. Special thanks to professor Erik Smith, Susan Lang, Matt Kimball, Jan Blakely, Bryan Benitez-Nelson, and Susan Denham at the Belle Baruch Field Laboratory for their field work assistances and laboratory measurement. Thanks to professor Richard Peterson for letting us use one of his RAD7s. Thanks to professor Bjorn Kjferve for his support calculating water volumes. Finally, thanks to Shane White, Anna Giles, Dr. Lea Mamo, Dr. James Tucker, Dr. Euan Provost, Dr. Sophie Prior, Dr. Alejandro Tagliafico, Georgia Foley, Lara Townsend, Damien Eggeling, Alison King, Dr. Matt Nimbs, and professor Steve Smith for their general support. We also thank the two anonymous reviewers for helping improve the overall quality of the paper.

Funding

The Australian Research Council (FT170100327), Swedish Research Council (2020-00457) and National Natural Science Foundation of China (41907162) provided funding for this project.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Marine Science Centre, Southern Cross University, P.O. Box 4321, Coffs Harbour, NSW, 2450, Australia

    Rogger E. Correa, Stephen R. Conrad, Praktan D. Wadnerkar, Christian J. Sanders & Isaac R. Santos

  2. Corporacion Merceditas – Merceditas Corporation, 050021, Medellin, Colombia

    Rogger E. Correa

  3. Forestry Corporation of New South Wales, Coffs Harbour, NSW, 2450, Australia

    Rogger E. Correa

  4. Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Soil and Groundwater Pollution Control, School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen, 518055, China

    Kai Xiao

  5. School of the Earth, Ocean, and Environment, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, 29208, USA

    Alicia M. Wilson

  6. Department of Marine Sciences, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden

    Isaac R. Santos

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  1. Rogger E. Correa
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  2. Kai Xiao
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  3. Stephen R. Conrad
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  4. Praktan D. Wadnerkar
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  5. Alicia M. Wilson
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  6. Christian J. Sanders
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  7. Isaac R. Santos
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Rogger E. Correa.

Additional information

Communicated by Neil Kamal Ganju

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Correa, R.E., Xiao, K., Conrad, S.R. et al. Groundwater Carbon Exports Exceed Sediment Carbon Burial in a Salt Marsh. Estuaries and Coasts 45, 1545–1561 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12237-021-01021-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12237-021-01021-1

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