Understanding the potential sources and environmental impacts of dissolved and suspended organic carbon in the diversified Ramganga River, Ganges Basin, India

Abstract

Abstract. The river network is one of the important transporters of nutrients from the environment and land masses to the oceans and regularly provides storage for several compounds. The variations in suspended and dissolved discharge of the river are more substantial than the changes in water discharge. (Suspended and dissolved) organic carbons (SOC and DOC) are imperative segments in the carbon cycle and fill in as essential food sources for amphibian sustenance networks. In the present study, 26 samples of water were collected from different locations over the 642 km stretch of the Ramganga River and its adjoining tributaries to observe the spatial variation of DOC, dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC), SOC and suspended inorganic carbon (SIC) in river water. The DOC and DIC values of Ramganga River goes between 1.49 to 4.65 and 9.61 to 36.6 mg L−1 with an average convergence of 2.5 and 20 mg L−1, individually, while in case of tributaries, these values extends between 0.09 to 4.52 and 4.61 to 42.36 mg L−1 with an average convergence of 2.13 and 21.1 mg L−1, separately. The estimations of SOC and SIC in the Ramganga River extend between 1.31 to 22.15 and 1.27 to 10.14 g kg−1 with an average convergence of 6.29 and 4.24 g kg−1, individually, though in tributaries, these values run between 0.80 to 47.23 and 0.31 to 22.94 g kg−1 with an average convergence of 9.25 and 5.14 g kg−1, separately. The results also show the higher values of DOC as compared with SOC and these values shows an increasing pattern with a decrease in elevation.