Dissolved load

Dissolved load is material, especially ions from chemical weathering, that are carried in solution by a stream. The dissolved load contributes to the total amount of material removed from a catchment. The amount of material carried as dissolved load is typically much smaller than the suspended load, though this is not always the case particularly when the available river flow is mostly harnessed for irrigation, industrial, etc. purposes. Dissolved load comprises a significant portion of the total material flux out of a landscape, and its composition is important in regulating the chemistry and biology of the stream water.

Salt export

The process of carrying salts by water to the sea or a land locked lake from a river basin is called salt export. When adequate salt export is not taking place, the river basin area particularly in lower reaches gradually converts into saline soils and/or alkali soils.[1] The salt export from the major rivers are

Salt export of important rivers
River @Mean annual flow to the sea Drainage area Dissolved load Suspended load
Billion cubic meters 1000 km2 Million tons/yr Million tons/yr
Amazon 5500 6300 287 900
Yangtze 1,063 1,950 226 478
Orinoco 946 950 50 210
Mekong 666 795 59 160
Mississippi 580 3,267 131 210
Brahmaputra 510 580 51 597
Ganga 250 750 84 329
Irrawaddy 422 430 90 285
Magdalena 236 240 28 220
Godavari 75 310 17 170
Huanghe 48 745 22 1,080
Krishna 24 257 12 1.74
Kavery 8 88 3.5 0.04
All rivers 31,400 101,000 3,600 13,505

@ includes water transfer to other river basins

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Hydronomic Zones for Developing Basin Water Conservation Strategies" (PDF). Retrieved 12 July 2015.

USGS CMG InfoBank: Suspended and Dissolved Loads


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