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Continuous flux of dissolved black carbon from a vanished tropical forest biome

Nature Geoscience volume 5, pages 618–622 (2012)Cite this article

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Abstract

Humans have used fire extensively as a tool to shape Earth’s vegetation. The slash-and-burn destruction of Brazil’s Atlantic forest, which once covered over 1.3 million km2 of present-day Brazil and was one of the largest tropical forest biomes on Earth1, is a prime example. Here, we estimate the amount of black carbon generated by the burning of the Atlantic forest, using historical records of land cover, satellite data and black carbon conversion ratios. We estimate that before 1973, destruction of the Atlantic forest generated 200–500 million tons of black carbon. We then estimate the amount of black carbon exported from this relict forest between 1997 and 2008, using measurements of polycyclic aromatic black carbon collected from a large river draining the region, and a continuous record of river discharge. We show that dissolved black carbon (DBC) continues to be mobilized from the watershed each year in the rainy season, despite the fact that widespread forest burning ceased in 1973. We estimate that the river exports 2,700 tons of DBC to the ocean each year. Scaling our findings up, we estimate that 50,000–70,000 tons of DBC are exported from the former forest each year. We suggest that an increase in black carbon production on land could increase the size of the refractory pool of dissolved organic carbon in the deep ocean.

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Figure 1: The study area.
Figure 2: Time series of Paraíba do Sul River for 1997–2008.
Figure 3: History of black carbon production in the drainage basin of Paraíba do Sul River for the past 200 years.

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Acknowledgements

This study was financially supported by Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico—CNPq (304.615/2010-2 and INCT Material Transfer at the Continent–Ocean Interface 573.601/08-9), Fundação de Amparo a Pesquisa do Estado doRio de Janeiro—FAPERJ (E-26/102.697/2008) and the Hanse Institute for Advanced Studies (HWK, Delmenhorst, Germany). Thanks to A. Antonio Rosa Gobo, M. Friebe and I. Ulber for technical support. Thanks to our colleagues at the United States Geological Service, E. G. Stets, R. G. Striegl and M. M. Dornblaser, R. G. M. Spencer (Woods Hole Research Center) and T. Riedel (University of Braunschweig) for advice on the hydrological modelling. Instituto Nacional de Meteorologia do Brasil provided meteorological data.

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Author notes

  1. Thorsten Dittmar and Carlos Eduardo de Rezende: These authors contributed equally to this work

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Max Planck Research Group for Marine Geochemistry, University of Oldenburg, Institute for Chemistry and Biology of the Marine Environment, Carl-von-Ossietzky-Str. 9-11, 26129 Oldenburg, Germany

    Thorsten Dittmar, Marcus Manecki & Jutta Niggemann

  2. Universidade Estadual do Norte Fluminense, Centro de Biociências e Biotecnologia, Laboratório de Ciências Ambientais, Av. Alberto Lamego 2000, Campos dos Goytacazes, Rio de Janeiro, 28.013-602, Brazil

    Carlos Eduardo de Rezende & Alvaro Ramon Coelho Ovalle

  3. Skidaway Institute of Oceanography, Savannah, Georgia 31411, USA

    Aron Stubbins

  4. Departamento de Geoquímica, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Instituto de Química, Morro do Valonguinho, s/n, Niterói, Centro, Rio de Janeiro, 24020-141, Brazil

    Marcelo Correa Bernardes

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Contributions

The idea of this study was jointly developed by C.E.d.R. and T.D. All authors contributed to sampling, chemical analysis and/or data interpretation, and to the general discussion. T.D. led the writing of the manuscript and the drafting of the figures. All authors provided input into the drafting and the final version of the manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Thorsten Dittmar or Carlos Eduardo de Rezende.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Dittmar, T., de Rezende, C., Manecki, M. et al. Continuous flux of dissolved black carbon from a vanished tropical forest biome. Nature Geosci 5, 618–622 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo1541

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