Pathways of Nitrous Oxide Production in the Eastern Tropical South Pacific Oxygen Minimum Zone
Daniel McCoy, Pierre Damien, Daniel J Clements, Simon X. Yang, Daniele Bianchi
Abstract
Abstract Oceanic emissions of nitrous oxide (N 2 O) account for roughly one‐third of all natural sources to the atmosphere. Hot‐spots of N 2 O outgassing occur over oxygen minimum zones (OMZs), where the presence of steep oxygen gradients surrounding anoxic waters leads to enhanced N 2 O production from both nitrification and denitrification. However, the relative contributions from these pathways to N 2 O production and outgassing in these regions remains poorly constrained, in part due to shared intermediary nitrogen tracers, and the tight coupling of denitrification sources and sinks. To shed light on this problem, we embed a new, mechanistic model of the OMZ nitrogen cycle within a three‐dimensional eddy‐resolving physical‐biogeochemical model of the Eastern Tropical South Pacific (ETSP), tracking contributions from remote advection, atmospheric exchange, and local nitrification and denitrification. The model indicates that net N 2 O production from denitrification is approximately one order of magnitude greater than nitrification within the ETSP OMZ. However, only ∼32% of denitrification‐derived N 2 O production ultimately outgasses to the atmosphere in this region (contributing ∼36% of the air‐sea N 2 O flux on an annual basis), while the remaining is exported out of the domain. Instead, remotely produced N 2 O advected into the OMZ region accounts for roughly half (∼57%) of the total N 2 O outgassing, with smaller contributions from nitrification (∼7%). Our results suggests that, together with enhanced production by denitrification, upwelling of remotely derived N 2 O contributes the most to N 2 O outgassing over the ETSP OMZ.