Effect of climate and CO2 changes on the greening of the Northern Hemisphere over the past two decades

Study of the effect of current climate changes on vegetation growth, and their spatial patterns improves our understanding of the interactions between terrestrial ecosystems and climatic systems. This paper explores the spatial patterns of vegetation growth responding to climate variability over Northern Hemisphere (> 25 degrees N) from 1980 to 2000 using a mechanistic terrestrial carbon model. The results indicate that changes in climate and atmospheric CO2 likely function as dominant controllers for the greening trend during the study period. At the continental scale, atmospheric CO2, temperature, and precipitation account for 49%, 31%, and 13% of the increase in growing season LAI, respectively, but their relative role is not constant across the study area. The increase in vegetation activity in most of Siberia is associated with warming, while that in central North America is primarily explained by the precipitation change. The model simulation also suggests that the regression slope of LAI to temperature increases with soil moisture, but decreases with temperature. This implies that the contribution of rising temperature to the current enhanced greening trend will weaken or even disappear under continued global warming. We also find that the effects of both vegetation precipitation use efficiency and atmospheric CO2 fertilization on the greening trend increase as soil moisture becomes limiting.