Description
Lakes are gassy, what with oxygen, carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, methane and more, being formed and exchanged within different compartments of a lake system. Many of us who spend time on lakes for work or for fun are familiar with the occasional gas bubble emerging out of the lake bottom and floating up to the surface. Stick your paddle in an area of mucky lake sediment, and a whole lot of bubbles, big and small, might squish out. We also see tiny air bubbles clinging to leaves of underwater aquatic plants, and even tucked up under the legs or abdomens of some aquatic insects.
Those gases are quite normal, and vary in magnitude from lake to lake, and within different areas of lakes. Those gases are also consequential as they relate to a bigger picture issue. As we examine the drivers and implications of a changing climate on the landscape, researchers are increasingly looking towards our freshwater resources for their contributions to greenhouse gas emissions.
This issue of LakeLine focuses in on a few of the studies that have been taking place in recent years, with an emphasis on methane production and emissions from surface waters. The studies span geographic regions, and factor in influences from lake zonation and bottom sediment type differences in freshwater basins like lakes, ponds and reservoirs of varying sizes.
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