Observations and modeling of a hydrothermal plume in Yellowstone Lake

Abstract

Acoustic Doppler current profiler and conductivity‐temperature‐depth data acquired in Yellowstone Lake reveal the presence of a buoyant plume above the “Deep Hole” hydrothermal system, located southeast of Stevenson Island. Distributed venting in the ~200 × 200‐m hydrothermal field creates a plume with vertical velocities of ~10 cm/s in the mid‐water column. Salinity profiles indicate that during the period of strong summer stratification the plume rises to a neutral buoyancy horizon at ~45‐m depth, corresponding to a ~70‐m rise height, where it generates an anomaly of ~5% (−0.0014 psu) relative to background lake water. We simulate the plume with a numerical model and find that a heat flux of 28 MW reproduces the salinity and vertical velocity observations, corresponding to a mass flux of 1.4 × 103 kg/s. When observational uncertainties are considered, the heat flux could range between 20 to 50 MW.