DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.14257924
title: Dataset related to the publication "Temporal dynamics and environmental controls of carbon dioxide and methane fluxes measured by the eddy covariance method over a boreal river"

description: Summary

Dataset related to the publication "Temporal dynamics and environmental controls of carbon dioxide and methane fluxes measured by the eddy covariance method over a boreal river" by Aki Vähä, Timo Vesala, Sofya Guseva, Anders Lindroth, Andreas Lorke, Sally MacIntyre, and Ivan Mammarella (2024), published in Biogeosciences.

Materials and Methods

Measurement site

The experiment was conducted on a floating platform on the River Kitinen in northern Finland. The measurements took place from 1 June to 2 October, 2018.

The River Kitinen is 235 km long and has a catchment area of 7672 km2. The catchment area consists mostly of managed boreal forest with Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris) and Norway spruce (Picea abies) as the main tree species, wetlands of which a large portion is drained, small streams and rivers, some low mountains and a few small settlements. The experiment site (67.37◦ N, 26.62◦ E, 173 m above sea level) was located next to the Finnish Meteorological Institute’s research and weather station in Tähtelä. At the experiment location the river is 180 m wide and forms a straight section extending approximately 600 m upstream and 1000 m downstream from the site. The direction of the river at the site is roughly north-northwest–south-southeast and it flows towards the south. The mean annual discharge, measured at the closest power plant downstream, is 103 m3 s−1. The maximum depth at the site is 7 m. The River Kitinen’s Strahler stream order at the site is 5. The floating platform was located about 70 m from the eastern river bank where the water depth was 4.5 m.

Eddy covariance

The eddy covariance system measuring water-atmosphere turbulent fluxes was mounted on a mast on the southern side of the platform. This installation consisted of an ultrasonic anemometer (uSonic-3 Scientific, METEK Meteorologische Messtechnik GmbH, Elmshorn, Germany) for measuring the wind speed in three Cartesian coordinates and the sonic temperature, an enclosed-path gas analyser (LI-7200RS, LI-COR Biosciences, Inc., Lincoln, Nebraska, USA) for measuring carbon dioxide and water vapour mole fractions, and a closed-path gas analyser (G1301-f, Picarro, Inc., Santa Clara, California, USA) for measuring methane and water vapour mole fractions. The centre of the sonic anemometer was 1.82 m above the water surface. An inclinometer (DOG2 micro-electro-mechanical system, Measurement Specialties, Inc., Hampton, Virginia, USA) was used for measuring the pitch and roll of the platform. Eddy covariance fluxes were calculated using the EddyUH software (Mammarella et al. 2016), following the state of art methodologies (Sabbatini et al. 2018, Nemitz et al. 2018).

Auxiliary measurements

Ambient air temperature and relative humidity were measured with a Rotronic HC2-S3C03 probe (Rotronic AG, Bassersdorf, Germany), mounted inside a Young model 41003 (R. M. Young Company, Traverse City, Michigan, USA) multi-plate radiation shield on the platform’s north-eastern corner. Air temperature and relative humidity were available only after 15th of June. Before that, the sonic temperature and humidity calculated from χH2O, measured with the LI-7200RS, were used instead. Atmospheric pressure and precipitation were measured at the Tähtelä weather station. Photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) in water was measured with two LI-192 sensors (LI-COR Biosciences, Inc., Lincoln, Nebraska, USA) and one LI-193 sensor (LI-COR). The sensors were hanging from wires at 0.3 m, 0.65 m and 1.0 m depths on a beam on the southern side of the platform. Measurements of water side CO2 partial pressure (pCO2) were done by using an off-axis integrated cavity output spectrometer (Ultraportable Greenhouse Gas Analyzer – UGGA), Los Gatos Research, Inc., Santa Clara, California, USA) that was connected to the headspace of an equilibrator consisting of a floating Plexiglas chamber.

A water temperature chain was set up 100 m upstream of the platform. It consisted of five temperature loggers of the type RBR Solo (RBR Ltd. Ottawa, Ontario, Canada). The loggers were placed on a taut line mooring at depths of 0.35 m, 1.35 m, 2.35 m, 3.35 m and 4.35 m (6 June to 17 June) and 0.07 m, 1.05 m, 2.05 m, 3.05 m and 4.05 m (17 June onwards). The topmost measurement was used as the surface temperature. The water flow velocity was measured with a acoustic Doppler velocimeter (Nortek Vector, Nortek AS, Rud, Norway) which was installed on a beam on the north-western corner of the platform, facing down (Guseva et al., 2021). The depth of the measurements was 0.4 m below the surface.