CHANGE OF WATER CHEMISTRY (DISSOLVED ORGANIC CARBON) WITH FREQUENT PEAT FIRES IN INDONESIAN PEATLAND

摘要

Tropical peat swamp forests in Southeast Asia had been considered to be one of the most important parts of larger ecosystems due to the huge amount of carbon stock. Yet, recent rapid and intensive deforestation to procure timber and land preparation for commercial plants or crops (oil palm or Acacia plantations) have induced fundamental changes in the material cycling. Especially, frequent peat fires occur in every dry period especially in Indonesia, which changes the environment fundamentally and emit huge amount of greenhouse gases. We focused on the effects of human impacts on groundwater chemistry in the degraded peatland area in East part of Sumatra Island and Central Kalimantan, Indonesia by comparing with the observation in intact peat swamp forest and secondary forest with no fire experiences. We analyzed both the quantity and quality of dissolved organic and inorganic matters in peatland groundwater and canal water. Our results suggest that frequent peat fires had great effect on change in water chemistry in both quality and quantity aspects especially of dissolved organic carbon.