Global water availability boosted by vegetation-driven changes in atmospheric moisture transport

Cui, Jiangpeng; Lian, Xu; Huntingford, Chris ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5941-7770; Gimeno, Luis; Wang, Tao; Ding, Jinzhi; He, Mingzhu; Xu, Hao; Chen, Anping; Gentine, Pierre; Piao, Shilong. 2022 Global water availability boosted by vegetation-driven changes in atmospheric moisture transport. Nature Geoscience, 15 (12). 982-988. 10.1038/s41561-022-01061-7

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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41561-022-01061-7

Abstract/Summary

Surface-water availability, defined as precipitation minus evapotranspiration, can be affected by changes in vegetation. These impacts can be local, due to the modification of evapotranspiration and precipitation, or non-local, due to changes in atmospheric moisture transport. However, the teleconnections of vegetation changes on water availability in downwind regions remain poorly constrained by observations. By linking measurements of local precipitation to a new hydrologically weighted leaf area index that accounts for both local and upwind vegetation contributions, we demonstrate that vegetation changes have increased global water availability at a rate of 0.26 mm yr−2 for the 2001–2018 period. Critically, this increase has attenuated about 15% of the recently observed decline in global water availability. The water availability increase is due to a greater rise in precipitation relative to evapotranspiration for over 53% of the global land surface. We also quantify the potential hydrological impacts of regional vegetation increases at any given location across global land areas. We find that enhanced vegetation is beneficial to both local and downwind water availability for ~45% of the land surface, whereas it is adverse elsewhere, primarily in water-limited or high-elevation regions. Our results highlight the potential strong effects of deliberate vegetation changes, such as afforestation programmes, on water resources beyond local and regional scales.

Item Type:	Publication - Article
Digital Object Identifier (DOI):	10.1038/s41561-022-01061-7
UKCEH and CEH Sections/Science Areas:	Hydro-climate Risks (Science Area 2017-)
ISSN:	1752-0894
Additional Information. Not used in RCUK Gateway to Research.:	Publisher link (see Related URLs) provides a read-only full-text copy of the published paper.
Additional Keywords:	atmospheric dynamics, climate change, climate sciences, environmental impact, hydrology
NORA Subject Terms:	Ecology and Environment Meteorology and Climatology Atmospheric Sciences
Related URLs:	Publisher
Date made live:	31 Dec 2022 15:06 +0 (UTC)
URI:	https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/533793

Item Type:

Publication - Article

Digital Object Identifier (DOI):

10.1038/s41561-022-01061-7

UKCEH and CEH Sections/Science Areas:

Hydro-climate Risks (Science Area 2017-)

ISSN:

1752-0894

Additional Information. Not used in RCUK Gateway to Research.:

Publisher link (see Related URLs) provides a read-only full-text copy of the published paper.

Additional Keywords:

atmospheric dynamics, climate change, climate sciences, environmental impact, hydrology