Episodic lake acidification in the Sierra Nevada, California

Seven high-altitude headwater catchments were studied from 1990 to 1994 to evaluate susceptibility to episodic acid neutralizing capacity (ANC) depression. Dilution (decreasing base cation concentrations) was the primary factor in ANC depression during snowmelt, accounting for 75 to 97% of the ANC reduction. In lakes where acidification (increasing anion concentrations) was noted, nitrate and sulfate were equally important during the first half of snowmelt, while sulfate dominated the latter half. A linear model, based on the relationship between minimum and fall-overturn ANC for the lakes in our study, estimated that none of the 114 lakes sampled during the 1985 EPA Western Lakes Survey had been episodically acidified (ANC < 0). Modifications of the model were used to predict that approximately 6 and 10% of Sierran lakes will become episodically acidified with increases in nitrate and sulfate deposition of 50 and 150%, respectively. No lakes will be chronically acidified with these depositional increases.