title: Riverine nitrogen loss in the Tibetan Plateau and potential impacts of climate change.
abstract: The Tibetan Plateau (TP) has been the subject of study on water circulation and global climate change. Given the environmental processes related to water outflows, there could be massive nutrient losses in the land surface of TP. In this study, we analyzed the nitrogen discharges of the major rivers flowing out of the TP based on the 5-year monitoring data. According to our calculation, the majority of nitrogen outflows were discharged through the upper Yangtze River and upper Huanghe River, representing ~29% and ~17% of total riverine outflows, respectively. In the entire nitrogen deficit in TP land surface, about 2.7 × 10(5)Mg/year was lost through riverine discharges. Due to the global warming, the changes of hydrologic processes in TP would possibly accelerate the riverine nitrogen outflows in the future.
authors.affiliation: School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China; Ministry of Education Laboratory for Earth Surface Processes, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China; China-Australia Centre for Sustainable Urban Development, Tianjin 300072, China.
authors.forename: Yindong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Tong
authors.affiliation: Ministry of Education Laboratory for Earth Surface Processes, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China; College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China.
authors.forename: Long
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China.
authors.forename: Jie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Chi
authors.affiliation: School of Environment and Natural Resources, Renmin University of China, Beijing 100872, China.
authors.forename: Gengchong
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Zhen
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Tibetan Environment Changes and Land Surface Processes, Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China; CAS Center for Excellence in Tibetan Plateau Earth Sciences, Beijing 100101, China.
authors.forename: Qianggong
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Chengdu Environmental Monitoring Center, Chengdu, Sichuan 610072, China.
authors.forename: Ruonan
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Chinese Academy for Environmental Planning, Beijing 100012, China.
authors.forename: Ruihua
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Yao
authors.affiliation: School of Environment and Natural Resources, Renmin University of China, Beijing 100872, China. Electronic address: zhw326@ruc.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Ministry of Education Laboratory for Earth Surface Processes, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China; College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China. Electronic address: wangxuejun@pku.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Xuejun
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Wang
keywords: Climate change; Nitrogen balance; Riverine outflows; Tibetan Plateau