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Kherlen River
Kherlen River (also known as Kerülen; Mongolian: Хэрлэн гол; Chinese: 克鲁伦河; pinyin: Kèlǔlún hé) is a 1,254 km river in Mongolia and China. It is also one of the two longest rivers in Mongolia, along with the Orkhon River.
The river originates in the south slopes of the Khentii mountains, near the Burkhan Khaldun mountain in the Khan Khentii Strictly Protected Area, about 180 kilometres or 112 miles northeast of Ulaanbaatar. This area constitutes the divide between the Arctic (Tuul River) and Pacific (Kherlen, Onon) basins and is consequently named "Three River Basins".
From there the Kherlen flows in a mostly eastern direction through the Khentii aimag. Further downriver, it crosses the eastern Mongolian steppe past Ulaan Ereg and Choibalsan, entering China at 48°3′N 115°36′E / 48.050°N 115.600°E and emptying into Hulun Nuur after another 164 kilometres or 102 miles.
The mean streamflow of Kherlen River has decreased by more than a half from 2000 to 2008 when compared with prior decades.
In years with high precipitation, the normally exitless Hulun Lake may overflow at its northern shore, and the water will meet the Ergune River after about 30 kilometres or 19 miles. The Ergune marks the border between Russia and China for about 944 kilometres or 587 miles, until it meets the Amur River. The system Kherlen-Ergune-Amur has a total length of 5,052 kilometres or 3,139 miles.
Near the city of Choibalsan in the Dornod province (far Northeast Mongolia), the Kherlen river feeds several soda lakes, located (geologically) in the north Kerulen Block of the Central Mongolian Fold System. They are closed lakes fed by groundwater, with hardly any surface inflow or outflow, in basins formed in basalt, pyroclastic material and rhyolite erupted from the Choibalsan–Onon volcanic chain during the late Cretaceous; among these lakes are the Tsaidam lakes, the Gurvany lakes and the Shar Burdiin lake. The groundwater that feeds the soda lakes comes from a shallow unconfined aquifer recharged by rainfall and snowmelt, and from precipitation in the highlands north of the lakes. But the local climate is semi-arid, with only 207 mm mean annual precipitation distributed unequally throughout the year. This means that groundwater recharge is relatively rare: only the largest precipitation events and snowmelt periods result in significant recharge.
The Kherlen River is the regional discharge point and also represents a hydrogeological divide for the shallow unconfined aquifer, as groundwater flows south along the topographic gradient. The lakes in their shallow closed basins act as evaporative discharge points.
Several of these lakes are exceedingly rich in uranium; in one location of the Shar Burdiin lake, uranium concentration has been measured at 62.5 μM, which may be the highest reported naturally occurring U concentration in a surface water body. Shar Burdiin is also the most highly evaporated lake.
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Kherlen River
Kherlen River (also known as Kerülen; Mongolian: Хэрлэн гол; Chinese: 克鲁伦河; pinyin: Kèlǔlún hé) is a 1,254 km river in Mongolia and China. It is also one of the two longest rivers in Mongolia, along with the Orkhon River.
The river originates in the south slopes of the Khentii mountains, near the Burkhan Khaldun mountain in the Khan Khentii Strictly Protected Area, about 180 kilometres or 112 miles northeast of Ulaanbaatar. This area constitutes the divide between the Arctic (Tuul River) and Pacific (Kherlen, Onon) basins and is consequently named "Three River Basins".
From there the Kherlen flows in a mostly eastern direction through the Khentii aimag. Further downriver, it crosses the eastern Mongolian steppe past Ulaan Ereg and Choibalsan, entering China at 48°3′N 115°36′E / 48.050°N 115.600°E and emptying into Hulun Nuur after another 164 kilometres or 102 miles.
The mean streamflow of Kherlen River has decreased by more than a half from 2000 to 2008 when compared with prior decades.
In years with high precipitation, the normally exitless Hulun Lake may overflow at its northern shore, and the water will meet the Ergune River after about 30 kilometres or 19 miles. The Ergune marks the border between Russia and China for about 944 kilometres or 587 miles, until it meets the Amur River. The system Kherlen-Ergune-Amur has a total length of 5,052 kilometres or 3,139 miles.
Near the city of Choibalsan in the Dornod province (far Northeast Mongolia), the Kherlen river feeds several soda lakes, located (geologically) in the north Kerulen Block of the Central Mongolian Fold System. They are closed lakes fed by groundwater, with hardly any surface inflow or outflow, in basins formed in basalt, pyroclastic material and rhyolite erupted from the Choibalsan–Onon volcanic chain during the late Cretaceous; among these lakes are the Tsaidam lakes, the Gurvany lakes and the Shar Burdiin lake. The groundwater that feeds the soda lakes comes from a shallow unconfined aquifer recharged by rainfall and snowmelt, and from precipitation in the highlands north of the lakes. But the local climate is semi-arid, with only 207 mm mean annual precipitation distributed unequally throughout the year. This means that groundwater recharge is relatively rare: only the largest precipitation events and snowmelt periods result in significant recharge.
The Kherlen River is the regional discharge point and also represents a hydrogeological divide for the shallow unconfined aquifer, as groundwater flows south along the topographic gradient. The lakes in their shallow closed basins act as evaporative discharge points.
Several of these lakes are exceedingly rich in uranium; in one location of the Shar Burdiin lake, uranium concentration has been measured at 62.5 μM, which may be the highest reported naturally occurring U concentration in a surface water body. Shar Burdiin is also the most highly evaporated lake.