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Preferred term

percent organic carbon

Definition

Weight percent total organic carbon (TOC) is one of the most commonly used descriptors for both Recent and ancient sediments. It is commonly considered to be approximately proportional to organic carbon accumulation rates and, therefore, a gauge of those rates. Weight percent TOC is also used to judge hydrocarbon source rock potential and primary productivity of the overlying water column.

Broader concept

variable

Note

[controlled by ] Tomas Staszevski , 2013-06-08" , "[source of definition ] Doyle, Larry J.; Garrels, Robert M. 1985. What does percent organic carbon in sediments measure? Geo-Marine Letters, Volume 5, Issue 1, pp.51-53

Scope note

US LTER controlled vocabulary

Creator

herbert.schentz@umweltbundesamt.at

URI

http://vocabs.lter-europe.net/EnvThes/22183

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Created 3/31/16, last modified 12/18/18

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