Vegetation Response to Rising CO2 Amplifies Contrasts in Water Resources Between Global Wet and Dry Land Areas

Rising atmospheric CO2 impacts on vegetation physiological processes can alter land feedbacks on precipitation and water resources, but understanding of regional differences in these changes is uncertain. We investigate the impact of rising CO2 on land water resources for different wetness levels using four Earth system models. We find an overall tendency of runoff to increase across all wetness levels. However, runoff increases in wet regions are much larger than those in dry regions, especially in wet seasons. This substantial amplification of contrasts between wet and dry regions increases at 3% per 100 ppm increase in CO2 relative to the historical period, reaching 18% for a quadrupling of CO2, quantified by a new wetting contrast index (WCI). Physiological effects suppress evapotranspiration more in wet than dry regions, which has a larger contribution than radiative forcing to the amplification of runoff contrast, reshaping the spatial distribution of future land water resources.

Automated summary

The study shows that rising atmospheric CO2 can impact vegetation physiological processes and alter land feedbacks on precipitation and water resources. Differences in these changes across regions can be significant, with runoff increasing more in wet regions compared to dry regions. Physiological effects play a larger role than radiative forcing in shaping the spatial distribution of future land water resources.