Journal
JOURNAL OF GREAT LAKES RESEARCH
Volume 42, Issue 6, Pages 1228-1240Publisher
ELSEVIER SCI LTD
DOI: 10.1016/j.jglr.2016.06.001
Keywords
Lake Erie; Hypoxia; Nutrient loads; Phosphorus; Ecological modeling; Hydrodynamic modeling
Funding
- University of Michigan Graham Sustainability Institute
- USEPA [EP-R5-11-07]
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Hypoxia, or low dissolved oxygen (DO) concentrations, in lakes is commonly linked to eutrophication caused by excessive nutrient loadings. While nutrient-driven eutrophication creates a potential for hypoxia, the full realization of this potential, as well as its location, ultimate size, and duration, is to a large degree dependent on the lake's physics. Herein, we employed a three-dimensional coupled hydrodynamic and ecological model of Lake Erie to explore the potential for spatial and temporal developments of hypoxia and its response to nutrient load reductions. Reducing loads by 40 to 50% relative to the 2008 load will result in significant reductions (-50%) of hypoxia in terms of its maximum and mean areal extents and duration, as well as providing significant improvements in mean hypolimnetic DO. We also explored the impact of different DO threshold concentrations to characterize hypoxia, and found that responses at lower thresholds are most sensitive to variation in nutrient loads. (C) 2016 International Association for Great Lakes Research. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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