Evaporative cooling over the Tibetan Plateau induced by vegetation growth

• Published in: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
• Main Authors: Shen, Miaogen, Piao, Shilong, Jeong, Su-Jong, Zhou, Liming, Zeng, Zhenzhong, Ciais, Philippe, Chen, Deliang, Huang, Mengtian, Jin, Chun-Sil, Li, Laurent Z. X., Li, Yue, Myneni, Ranga B., Yang, Kun, Zhang, Gengxin, Zhang, Yangjian, Yao, Tandong
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: National Academy of Sciences 2015
• Subjects: Physical Sciences; Arctic; albedo
• Online Access: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4522821/; http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26170316; https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1504418112

Understanding land-surface biophysical feedbacks to the atmosphere is needed if we are to simulate regional climate accurately. In the Arctic, previous studies have shown that enhanced vegetation growth decreases albedo and amplifies warming. In contrast, on the Tibetan Plateau, a statistical model based on in situ observations and decomposition of the surface energy budget suggests that increased vegetation activity may attenuate daytime warming by enhancing evapotranspiration (ET), a cooling process. A regional climate model also simulates daytime cooling when prescribed with increased vegetation activity, but with a magnitude smaller than observed, likely because this model simulates weaker ET enhancement in response to increased vegetation growth.