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Concentrations of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) from terrestrial sources have been increasing in freshwaters across large parts of the boreal region. According to results from large-scale field and detailed laboratory studies, such a DOC increase could potentially stimulate carbon dioxide (CO2) production, subsequently increasing the partial pressure of CO2 (pCO2) in freshwaters. However, the response of pCO2 to the presently observed long-term increase in DOC in freshwaters is still unknown. In this study, we tested whether the commonly found spatial DOC-pCO2 relationship is also valid on a temporal scale by analyzing time series of water chemical data from 71 lakes, 30 streams, and 4 river mouths distributed across all of Sweden over a 17 year period. We observed that long-term DOC increases in Swedish waters are disconnected from temporal pCO2 trends. Thus pCO2 is presently not following DOC concentration trends, which has important implications for modeling future CO2 emissions from boreal waters.

Globally, inland waters emit over 2 Pg of carbon per year as carbon dioxide, of which the majority originates from streams and rivers. Despite the global significance of fluvial carbon dioxide emissions, little is known about their diel dynamics. Here we present a large-scale assessment of day- and night-time carbon dioxide fluxes at the water-air interface across 34 European streams. We directly measured fluxes four times between October 2016 and July 2017 using drifting chambers. Median fluxes are 1.4 and 2.1 mmol m���2 h���1 at midday and midnight, respectively, with night fluxes exceeding those during the day by 39%. We attribute diel carbon dioxide flux variability mainly to changes in the water partial pressure of carbon dioxide. However, no consistent drivers could be identified across sites. Our findings highlight widespread day-night changes in fluvial carbon dioxide fluxes and suggest that the time of day greatly influences measured carbon dioxide fluxes across European streams.