Internal phosphorus loading and its driving factors in the dry period of Brazilian semiarid reservoirs

Abstract

This study investigated the relationships between physical, limnological and climatic drivers with the internal total phosphorus (TP) loading produced over the dry period in 30 water supply reservoirs of the Brazilian semiarid. Improvements in the understanding of sedimentary TP fluxes in reservoirs of dryland regions are pressing as they usually have serious water quality related issues, remaining mostly eutrophic especially under frequent drought events. Gross daily fluxes and net seasonal average release rates were calculated from mass balance and regression equations considering water and sediment TP concentrations, anoxic duration, water temperature and fish contribution. Additionally, the ratio of wind speed to reservoir volume was proposed as a new surrogate and then applied as explanatory variable to predictive models. The results indicated TP release rates higher than reported for non-semiarid lakes/reservoirs with average gross fluxes ranging from 17.64 to 35.99 mg m−2 day−1. This may be attributed to the enriched sediments (1029.49 ± 552.49 mg kg−1) allied with warmer water temperature, high trophic state, and prolonged anoxic periods (average duration of about 60 days). The average release rates were negatively correlated with water transparency and water depth, and positively correlated with Chl-a, wind speed and trophic state. The release rates increased across the trophic gradient (p < 0.05), about 10-fold higher under hypertrophic conditions than in oligotrophic ones. As anoxia is linked with eutrophication, phosphorus release is more likely in eutrophic ecosystems. Regarding the new surrogate, a strong predictive ability for TP release (R2: 0.26–0.93) was observed. Similarly, the proposed models presented a physically consistent behavior with a stabilizing releasing pattern suggesting the achievement of equilibrium in nutrient exchange between sediment-water interface. This research advanced by combining and proposing methods to assess and quantify sedimentary fluxes in data-scarce regions balancing accuracy and transferability, in order to be replicable to other dryland environments globally.