Drivers of inorganic and organic carbon removal in aged oceanic crust

Abstract

Large volumes of fluid flow through aged oceanic crust. Given the scale of this water flux, the exchange of organic and inorganic carbon that it mediates between the crust and deep ocean can be significant. However, off-axis carbon fluxes in older oceanic crust are still poorly constrained because access to low-temperature fluids from this environment is limited. At North Pond, a sedimented depression located on 8-million-year-old crust on the flank of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, circulating crustal fluids are accessible through drilled borehole observatories. Here, fluids are cool (≤ 20 °C), oxygenated and bear strong geochemical similarities to bottom seawater. In this study, we report the concentrations and isotopic composition of dissolved organic and inorganic carbon from crustal fluids that were sampled six years after the installation of borehole observatories. These which better represent the fluid geochemistry prior to drilling and perturbation than earlier studies. Radiocarbon-based signatures within carbon reservoirs support divergent shallow and deep fluid pathways within the crust. We also report a net loss of both dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) and dissolved organic carbon (DOC) from the fluid during isolation in the crust. The removal of DOC is isotopically selective and consistent with microbe-mediated DOC oxidation. The loss of DIC is consistent with carbonate precipitation, although geochemical signatures of DIC addition to the fluids from DOC oxidation and basalt weathering are also evident. Extrapolated to global fluxes, systems like North Pond could be responsible for a net loss of ∼ 10¹¹ mol C yr⁻¹ of DIC and ∼ 10¹¹ mol C yr⁻¹ of DOC during the circulation of fluids through oceanic crust at low temperatures.