Impact of Land Use Changes on Surface Warming in China

• Published in: Advances in atmospheric sciences Vol. 22; no. 3; pp. 343 - 348
• Main Author: 张井勇 董文杰 吴凌云 魏江峰 陈佩燕 Dong-KyouLEE
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Dordrecht Springer Nature B.V 01.05.2005; Atmospheric Sciences Program, School of Earth and Environmental Science,Seoul National University, Seoul 151-747, Korea%National Climate Center, China Meteorological Administration, Beijing 100081%School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332-0340, U. S. A.%Shanghai Typhoon Institute, China Meteorological Administration, Shanghai 200030%Atmospheric Sciences Program, School of Earth and Environmental Sciences,Seoul National University, Seoul 151-747, Korea; Global Change System for Analysis, Research and Training/Regional Research Center for Temperate East Asia,Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100029
• Subjects: Agriculture; Atmospheric circulation; Atmospheric circulation changes; Atmospheric sciences; Biological fertilization; Changes; Climate trends; Daily temperatures; Deforestation; Desertification; Farm buildings; Fertilization; Greenhouse effect; Heat flux; Heat transfer; Heterogeneity; Human influences; Impact analysis; Irrigation; Island effects; Land use; NCEP/NCAR reanalysis; Plant cover; River basins; Studies; Surface temperature; Temperature; Temperature effects; Temperature trends; Trends; Urban heat islands; Urbanization; Vegetation; Vegetation cover; 土地利用变化; 温室效应; 温度控制; 表面变暖; China; China, People's Rep., Huang He R; China, People's Rep; temperature; surface warming; land use change
• ISSN: 0256-1530; 1861-9533
• DOI: 10.1007/bf02918748

Land use changes such as urbanization, agriculture, pasturing, deforestation, desertification and irrigation can change the land surface heat flux directly, and also change the atmospheric circulation indirectly, and therefore affect the local temperature. But it is difficult to separate their effects from climate trends such as greenhouse-gas effects. Comparing the decadal trends of the observation station data with those of the NCEP/NCAR Reanalysis (NNR) data provides a good method to separate the effects because the NNR is insensitive to land surface changes. The effects of urbanization and other land use changes over China are estimated by using the difference between the station and the NNR surface temperature trends. Our results show that urbanization and other land use changes may contribute to the observed 0.12℃ (10yr)^-1 increase for daily mean surface temperature, and the 0.20℃ (10yr)^-1 and 0.03℃(10 yr)^-1 increases for the daily minimum and maximum surface temperatures, respectively. The urban heat island effect and the effects of other land-use changes mayalso play an important role in the diurnal temperature range change. The spatial pattern of the differences in trends shows a marked heterogeneity.The land surface degradation such as deforestation and desertification due to human activities over northern China, and rapidly-developed urbanization over southern China, may have mostly contributed to the increases at stations north of about 38°N and in Southeast China, respectively. Furthermore, the vegetation cover increase due to irrigation and fertilization may have contributed to the decreasing trend of surface temperature over the lower Yellow River Basin. The study illustrates the possible impacts of land use changes on surface temperature over China.