Global Riverine Carbon and Sediment Export Grids

Gridded estimates for riverine export of carbon and sediments across continental areas at a 0.5 x 0.5 degree spatial resolution. The dataset includes fluxes for dissolved organic carbon (DOC), particulate organic carbon (POC), bicarbonate, atmospheric CO2 consumption from rock weathering, and sediment, measured in tC/km2/yr and t/km2/yr. It is based on empirical models and is associated with ORNL_CLOUD.

Use Cases

• Modeling the global carbon cycle by analyzing spatial patterns of DOC, POC, and bicarbonate export.
• Quantifying atmospheric CO2 consumption via continental rock weathering using the specific bicarbonate-of-atmospheric-origin flux layer.
• Assessing sediment transport and erosion rates at a continental scale using the gridded sediment export data.
• Calibrating or validating hydrological and biogeochemical models with empirically derived, spatially explicit flux estimates.

Strengths

• Provides a complete, gridded spatial coverage for all continental areas at a consistent 0.5-degree resolution.
• Includes five distinct, modeled flux variables (DOC, POC, bicarbonate, atmospheric CO2 consumption, sediment) for integrated analysis.

Limitations

• Specific column names, row counts, and dataset size are not provided by any source.
• Sources conflict on the last updated date, reporting either 1995-12-31 or 2026-03 13.

Provenance

Source

ORNL_CLOUD

Collection Method

Derived from empirical models.

Time Range

null

Freshness

2026-03-13 01:34:01.548517

Geography

Global continental area.