1Chapter 7 What Controls the Composition of River water and Seawater: Equilibrium versus Kinetic Ocean (10/14/04) James W. Murray University of Washington We have covered how to calculate the equilibrium chemical composition of natural water systems. You have learned how to set up simple box models to learn about controls on ocean chemistry. Lets now tie this up with the final question in this section: What controls the chemical composition of riverwater and seawater? Some of this material will be your responsibility in the group study project #1. In Chapter 2 we learned that to a first approximation the input to the ocean from rivers is balanced by removal to the sediments with adjustments for inputs and removal from hydrothermal circulation at mid-ocean ridges. In the early days of chemical oceanography it was thought that, because of the long residence times, the major ion composition of seawater had been approximately constant over geological time and that chemical equilibrium might explain the composition. With the growth of paleoceanography it has become clear that there have probably been significant excursions in the composition of the ocean-atmosphere system (Berner et al., 1983; Berner, 1991) and that a kinetic or dynamic flux balance model is more appropriate. I. The Chemical Inflow from Rivers Ions transported by rivers are the most important source of most elements to the ocean. The composition of river water is significantly different from seawater. The concentrations are compared in Table 7-1. Some characteristic ratios are also compared. To a first approximation seawater is mainly a Na+ and Cl- solution while river water is a Ca2+ and HCO3- solution. It is pretty clear that we can not make seawater simply by evaporation of river water. Other factors must be involved and significant chemical reactions and modifications must take place. Table 7-1 The composition of average seawater and river water in mmol kg-1. Element Seawater (mmol kg-1) River water (mmol kg-1) Na 468.0 0.26 Mg 53.1 0.17 Ca 10.3 0.38 K 10.2 0.07 Sr 0.09 ---- Cl 546.0 0.22 SO4 28.2 0.11 HCO3 2.39 0.96 Br 0.84 ---- mainly mainly Na+ and Cl- Ca2+ and HCO3- RATIOS Na/K Mg/Ca Na/Ca (Ca+Mg)/HCO3 Oceans 45.6 5.22 45.9 26.64 Rivers 6.0 0.42 0.8 0.592 There is significant variability in the composition of rivers between continents. The average compositions for different continents are shown in Table 7-2 (from Holland,1978). Table 7-2 The mean composition of rivers on different continents (in ppm). The concentrations for anions and cations are given in meq l-1 in the bottom two rows. Data from Livingston (1963). Table from Holland, 1978. In general the weathering reaction on continents can be written as congruent or incongruent reactions (see Table 14.1 of Libes, 1992). In congruent reactions the total mineral goes into solution. In incongruent reactions the initial mineral is leached and modified and converted into a secondary mineral. Weathering of CaCO3 is considered a congruent reaction. CaCO3(s) + CO2(g) + H2O = Ca2+ + 2 HCO3- Weathering of alumino-silicate minerals to clay minerals are examples of incongruent reactions. silicate minerals + CO2(g) + H2O == clay minerals + HCO3- + 2 H4SiO4° + cation We can write these weathering reactions in terms of H+, CO2(g) or H2CO3. For example the weathering of the potassium feldspar mineral called orthoclase (KAlSi3O8(s)) to the clay mineral called kaolinite (Al2Si2O5(OH)4(s)) is an important reaction in soils from humid climates. We can write the reaction in terms of H+ as follows: KAlSi3O8(s) + H+ + 9/2H2O = 1/2 Al2Si2O5(OH)4(s) + K+ + 2 H4SiO4° The same reaction written in terms of atmospheric CO2(g) would be: KAlSi3O8(s) + CO2(g) + 11/2H2O = 1/2 Al2Si2O5(OH)4(s) + K+ + HCO3- + 2H4SiO4° For a different feldspar called plagioclase which contains an equal mole fraction Na and Ca, we can write: 4 Na0.5Ca0.5Al1.5Si2.5O8 (s) + 6CO2(g) + 5H2O = 3 Al2Si2O5(OH)4(s) + 2Na+ + 2 Ca2+ + 4 H4SiO4° + 6 HCO3-3 You can see that in general, during weathering, a structured aluminosilicate (feldspar) is converted into a cation-poor, degraded aluminosilicate (clay), cations and silicic acid go into solution, CO2(g) is consumed and HCO3- is produced. The bicarbonate concentration released is equivalent to the cations released according to the stoichiometry of the reaction. There are many different minerals in rocks and they weather with different susceptibilities. The stability of minerals with respect to weathering (Goldrich's "mineral stability series") is shown in Table 7-3 (Goldich, 1938). Among the mafic minerals (those with Mg and Fe), olivine weathers much faster than biotite. Quartz and K-feldspar are more resistant to weathering than the plagioclase minerals. Such weathering susceptibilities are clear when you look at rocks in the field. Table 7-3 (from Goldich, 1938) Weathering of carbonate minerals consumes one CO2 from the atmosphere and produces one CO32- (which can be expressed as two HCO3-) from the mineral thus there should be about twice as much HCO3- as Ca2+. In a plot of HCO3- versus Ca2+ (Fig. 7-1, from Holland, 1978) we see that most of the world's major rivers fall close to the line of HCO3- = 2Ca2+ which is consistent with weathering of carbonate minerals being a major control. Most rivers that don't fall on the line are above the line consistent with a silicate weathering source for some of the HCO3-. The Rio Grande is the only major river below the line because gypsum can be a major source of Ca2+. The average composition of rivers from different continents is plotted in Fig 8-2 (from Garrels and Mackenzie, 1971). You can see that most of the variability in composition between different continents is due to Ca2+ and HCO3-. This is because Europe, North America and Asia have more carbonate rocks than South America and Africa. The products of silicate weathering are more uniformly distributed between continents.. Example: We can estimate the percent of CO2 neutralized by silicate weathering using the following simple model. We assume that on average silicate minerals produce one HCO3- from each CO2(g) consumed while releasing 2H4SiO4(e.g.