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Response of Water Use Efficiency to Global Environmental Change Based on Output From Terrestrial Biosphere Models

Journal Article · · Global Biogeochemical Cycles
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1002/2017GB005733· OSTI ID:1409248
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [5];  [6];  [7];  [8];  [9];  [10];  [11];  [12];  [13];  [12];  [12];  [14];  [12];  [15];  [1]
  1. Tsinghua Univ., Beijing (China)
  2. Griffith Univ., Nathan Queensland (Australia)
  3. Woods Hole Research Center, Falmouth, MA (United States); Northern Arizona Univ., Flagstaff, AZ (United States)
  4. Lab. des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement, Gif-sur-Yvette (France)
  5. Univ. of Oklahoma, Norman, OK (United States)
  6. California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA (United States)
  7. Carnegie Institution for Science, Stanford, CA (United States)
  8. California State Uni., Monterey Bay, Seasid, CA (United States)
  9. Montana State Univ., Bozeman, MT (United States)
  10. Northern Arizona Univ., Flagstaff, AZ (United States)
  11. Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Beijing (China); Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Beijing (China)
  12. Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
  13. Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL (United States)
  14. Tohoku Univ., Sendai (Japan)
  15. Tsinghua Univ., Beijing (China); Qinghai Univ., Xining (China)
+ Show Author Affiliations
Here, water use efficiency (WUE), defined as the ratio of gross primary productivity and evapotranspiration at the ecosystem scale, is a critical variable linking the carbon and water cycles. Incorporating a dependency on vapor pressure deficit, apparent underlying WUE (uWUE) provides a better indicator of how terrestrial ecosystems respond to environmental changes than other WUE formulations. Here we used 20th century simulations from four terrestrial biosphere models to develop a novel variance decomposition method. With this method, we attributed variations in apparent uWUE to both the trend and interannual variation of environmental drivers. The secular increase in atmospheric CO2 explained a clear majority of total variation (66 ± 32%: mean ± one standard deviation), followed by positive trends in nitrogen deposition and climate, as well as a negative trend in land use change. In contrast, interannual variation was mostly driven by interannual climate variability. To analyze the mechanism of the CO2 effect, we partitioned the apparent uWUE into the transpiration ratio (transpiration over evapotranspiration) and potential uWUE. The relative increase in potential uWUE parallels that of CO2, but this direct CO2 effect was offset by 20 ± 4% by changes in ecosystem structure, that is, leaf area index for different vegetation types. However, the decrease in transpiration due to stomatal closure with rising CO2 was reduced by 84% by an increase in leaf area index, resulting in small changes in the transpiration ratio. CO2 concentration thus plays a dominant role in driving apparent uWUE variations over time, but its role differs for the two constituent components: potential uWUE and transpiration.
Research Organization:
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE; USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER) (SC-23)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-05CH11231; AC05-00OR22725
OSTI ID:
1409248
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1408787
OSTI ID: 1563939
OSTI ID: 23159815
Journal Information:
Global Biogeochemical Cycles, Journal Name: Global Biogeochemical Cycles Journal Issue: N/A Vol. 31; ISSN 0886-6236
Publisher:
American Geophysical Union (AGU)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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Cited By (6)

The effect of Indian summer monsoon on the seasonal variation of carbon sequestration by a forest ecosystem over North-East India journal January 2020
Forest‐Type‐Dependent Water Use Efficiency Trends Across the Northern Hemisphere journal August 2018
Gas exchange and water‐use efficiency in plant canopies journal December 2018
Short-Term Nitrogen Addition Does Not Significantly Alter the Effects of Seasonal Drought on Leaf Functional Traits in Machilus pauhoi Kanehira Seedlings journal January 2019
Response of Ecosystem Water Use Efficiency to Drought over China during 1982–2015: Spatiotemporal Variability and Resilience journal July 2019
Assessing the Impacts of Urbanization on Albedo in Jing-Jin-Ji Region of China journal July 2018

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