6 Paleolimnological Records of Climate and Environmental Change (Posters)

Friday, 28 March 2025
8:30 AM - 5:30 PM
North Great Hall

INDUSTRIAL METAL CONTAMINATION RECORDED IN THE REMOTE BURIAL LAKE, ARCTIC ALASKA

Paper number: 6-9
Program: Theme Sessions
Time: 8:30 AM – 5:30 PM

Authors

Abstract

Global distillation is a process by which industrial metal contaminants emitted at lower latitudes are transported poleward. To investigate the extent of distal industrialization impacts on remote arctic regions, we present a 11-thousand-year (ka) record of metal concentrations and fluxes in a sediment core from Burial Lake, arctic Alaska. Burial Lake, located in the Noatak National Preserve, has no industrial activity within at least a 150 km radius and has a well-established record of paleoclimate and paleoenvironmental change that has been developed across 25 years of research. These characteristics make it an ideal location to differentiate natural and anthropogenic drivers of metal inputs to remote settings. The full Holocene record informs background variability in metal fluxes into the lake and highlights the anthropogenically-driven deviation from that background since industrialization. All 24 metals show between a 1x to 7x increase in the flux from the pre-industrial average to the value at 1990 CE. The increase in all metal inputs beginning at the end of the 19th century shows clear evidence of metal contaminants reaching the poles in rapid response to early global industrialization. Three metals, As, Co, and Ni, feature fluxes close to or higher than industrial levels during the beginning of the record from 10 to 9 ka. These high values correspond with the peak in a magnetic record of aeolian sediment deposition into Burial Lake, suggesting that these metals were delivered naturally by wind-blown sediment at rates similar to current industrial levels. Additionally, natural deposition values give further insight into the climate of early Holocene Alaska. This record demonstrates the impacts of global industrialization on remote areas and the far-reaching nature of metal contamination. It also draws comparisons between natural climate forces and man-made ones.

Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs. Vol. 57, No. 3

doi: 10.1130/abs/2025NE-408366

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