Nathalie de Noblet-Ducoudré

A dynamic global vegetation model for studies of the coupled atmosphere‐biosphere system

This work presents a new dynamic global vegetation model designed as an extension of an existing surface-vegetation-atmosphere transfer scheme which is included in a coupled ocean-atmosphere general circulation model. The new dynamic global vegetation model simulates the principal processes of the continental biosphere influencing the global carbon cycle (photosynthesis, autotrophic and heterotrophic respiration of plants and in soils, fire, etc.) as well as latent, sensible, and kinetic energy exchanges at the surface of soils and plants. As a dynamic vegetation model, it explicitly represents competitive processes such as light competition, sapling establishment, etc. It can thus be used in simulations for the study of feedbacks between transient climate and vegetation cover changes, but it can also be used with a prescribed vegetation distribution. The whole seasonal phenological cycle is prognostically calculated without any prescribed dates or use of satellite data. The model is coupled to the IPSL-CM4 coupled atmosphere-ocean-vegetation model. Carbon and surface energy fluxes from the coupled hydrology-vegetation model compare well with observations at FluxNet sites. Simulated vegetation distribution and leaf density in a global simulation are evaluated against observations, and carbon stocks and fluxes are compared to available estimates, with satisfying results.

Changes in climate and land use have a larger direct impact than rising CO2 on global river runoff trends

The significant worldwide increase in observed river runoff has been tentatively attributed to the stomatal “antitranspirant” response of plants to rising atmospheric CO2 [Gedney N, Cox PM, Betts RA, Boucher O, Huntingford C, Stott PA (2006) Nature 439: 835–838]. However, CO2 also is a plant fertilizer. When allowing for the increase in foliage area that results from increasing atmospheric CO2 levels in a global vegetation model, we find a decrease in global runoff from 1901 to 1999. This finding highlights the importance of vegetation structure feedback on the water balance of the land surface. Therefore, the elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration does not explain the estimated increase in global runoff over the last century. In contrast, we find that changes in mean climate, as well as its variability, do contribute to the global runoff increase. Using historic land-use data, we show that land-use change plays an additional important role in controlling regional runoff values, particularly in the tropics. Land-use change has been strongest in tropical regions, and its contribution is substantially larger than that of climate change. On average, land-use change has increased global runoff by 0.08 mm/year2 and accounts for ≈50% of the reconstructed global runoff trend over the last century. Therefore, we emphasize the importance of land-cover change in forecasting future freshwater availability and climate.

Climatic Impact of Global-Scale Deforestation: Radiative versus Nonradiative Processes

A fully coupled land–ocean–atmosphere GCM is used to explore the biogeophysical impact of large-scale deforestation on surface climate. By analyzing the model sensitivity to global-scale replacement of forests by grassland, it is shown that the surface albedo increase owing to deforestation has a cooling effect of 21.36 K globally. On the other hand, forest removal decreases evapotranspiration efficiency and decreases surface roughness, both leading to a global surface warming of 0.24 and 0.29 K, respectively. The net biogeophysical impact of deforestation results from the competition between these effects. Globally, the albedo effect is dominant because of its wider-scale impact, and the net biogeophysical impact of deforestation is thus a cooling of 21 K. Over land, the balance between the different processes varies with latitude. In temperate and boreal zones of the Northern Hemisphere the albedo effect is stronger and deforestation thus induces a cooling. Conversely, in the tropics the net impact of deforestation is a warming, because evapotranspiration efficiency and surface roughness provide the dominant influence. The authors also explore the importance of the ocean coupling in shaping the climate response to deforestation. First, the temperature over ocean responds to the land cover perturbation. Second, even the temperature change over land is greatly affected by the ocean coupling. By assuming fixed oceanic conditions, the net effect of deforestation, averaged over all land areas, is a warming, whereas taking into account the coupling with the ocean leads, on the contrary, to a net land cooling. Furthermore, it is shown that the main parameter involved in the coupling with the ocean is surface albedo. Indeed, a change in albedo modifies temperature and humidity in the whole troposphere, thus enabling the initially land-confined perturbation to be transferred to the ocean. Finally, the radiative forcing framework is discussed in the context of land cover change impact on climate. The experiments herein illustrate that deforestation triggers two opposite types of forcing mechanisms—radiative forcing (owing to surface albedo change) and nonradiative forcing (owing to change in evapotranspiration efficiency and surface roughness)— that exhibit a similar magnitude globally. However, when applying the radiative forcing concept, nonradiative processes are ignored, which may lead to a misrepresentation of land cover change impact on climate.

Spatiotemporal patterns of terrestrial carbon cycle during the 20th century

[1] We evaluated how climate change, rising atmospheric CO 2 concentration, and land use change influenced the terrestrial carbon (C) cycle for the last century using a process-based ecosystem model. Over the last century, the modeled land use change emitted about 129 Pg of C to the atmosphere. About 76% (or 98 Pg C) of this emission, however, was offset by net C uptake on land driven by climate changes and rising atmospheric CO 2 concentration. Thus, the modeled net release of C from the terrestrial ecosystems to the atmosphere from 1901 to 2002 is about 31 Pg C. Global net primary productivity (NPP) has significantly increased by 14% during the last century, especially since the 1970s. From 1980 to 2002, global NPP increased with an average increase rate of 0.4% yr ―1 . At global scale, such an increase seems to be primarily attributed to the increase in atmospheric CO 2 concentration, and then to precipitation change. Over the last 2 decades, climate change and rising CO 2 forced the land carbon sink (1.6 Pg C yr ―1 for 1980s and 2.2 Pg C yr ―1 for 1990s) to be larger than land use change driven carbon emissions (1.0 Pg C yr ―1 for 1980s and 1.2 Pg C yr ―1 for 1990s), resulting a net land sink of 0.5 Pg C yr ―1 in the 1980s and of 1.0 Pg C yr ―1 in the 1990s. The largest C emission from land use change appeared in tropical regions with an average emission of 0.6 Pg C yr ―1 in 1980s and 0.7 Pg C yr ―1 in 1990s, which is slightly larger than net carbon uptake due to CO 2 fertilization and climate change. Thus, net carbon balance of tropical lands is close to neutral over the past 2 decades (about 0.13 Pg C yr ―1 in 1980s and 0.03 Pg C yr ―1 in 1990s). We also found that current global warming has already started accelerating C loss from terrestrial ecosystems, by enhanced decomposition of soil organic carbon. In response to warming trends only, the global net carbon uptake significantly decreased, offsetting about 70% of the increase in global net carbon uptake owing to CO 2 fertilization during 1980―2002. The global terrestrial C cycle also shows large year-to-year variations, and different regions have quite distinct dominant drivers. Generally, interannual changes of carbon fluxes in tropical and temperate ecosystems are mainly explained by precipitation variability, while temperature variability plays a major role in boreal ecosystems.

Hot European Summers and the Role of Soil Moisture in the Propagation of Mediterranean Drought

Abstract Drought in spring and early summer has been shown to precede anomalous hot summer temperature. In particular, drought in the Mediterranean region has been recently shown to precede and to contribute to the development of extreme heat in continental Europe. In this paper, this mechanism is investigated by performing integrations of a regional mesoscale model at the scale of the European continent in order to reproduce hot summer inception, starting with different initial values of soil moisture south of 46°N. The mesoscale model is driven by the large-scale atmospheric conditions corresponding to the 10 hottest summers on record from the European Climate Assessment dataset. A northward progression of heat and drought from late spring to summer is observed from the Mediterranean regions, which leads to a further increase of temperature during summer in temperate continental Europe. Dry air formed over dry soils in the Mediterranean region induces less convection and diminished cloudiness, which get...

Including Croplands in a Global Biosphere Model: Methodology and Evaluation at Specific Sites

Abstract There is a strong international demand for quantitative estimates of both carbon sources/sinks, and water availability at the land surface at various spatial scales (regional to global). These estimates can be derived (and usually are) from global biosphere models, which simulate physiological, biogeochemical, and biophysical processes, using a variety of plant functional types. Now, the representation of the large area covered with managed land (e.g., croplands, grasslands) is still rather basic in these models, which were first designed to simulate natural ecosystems, while more and more land is heavily disturbed by man (crops cover ∼35% and grasslands ∼30%–40% of western Europes area as a result of massive deforestation mainly in the Middle Ages). In this paper a methodology is presented that combines the use of a dynamic global vegetation model (DGVM) known as Organizing Carbon and Hydrology in Dynamic Ecosystems (ORCHIDEE) and a generic crop model [the Simulateur Multidisciplinaire pour les...

Hot Desert Albedo and Climate Change: Mid-Holocene Monsoon in North Africa

Abstract Many models in the framework of the Paleoclimate Modelling Intercomparison Project have undertaken simulations of the mid-Holocene (6 kyr ago) climate change. Analysis of the results have mainly focused on the North African summer monsoon that was enhanced 6 kyr ago, in all models, in response to the prescribed enhanced summer insolation. The magnitude of the simulated increase in total rainfall is very different, however, among the models, and so is the prescribed mean hot desert albedo, which varies from 19% to 38%. The appropriate prescription of hot deserts brightness, in the simulation of present-day climate, is known to be a key parameter since the work of Charney, which has been confirmed by many subsequent studies. There is yet no consensus, however, on the albedo climatological values to be used by climate modelers. Here, it is questioned whether changes in the prescription of hot desert albedo may also affect the simulated intensity of climate change. Using the Laboratoire de Meteorolo...

Effects of interactive vegetation phenology on the 2003 summer heat waves

This paper investigates the impact of accounting for interactive plant phenology on the simulation of the June and August 2003 European heat waves. A sensitivity analysis is conducted here by using the WRF atmospheric model and the ORCHIDEE land-surface model over France with (1) a prescribed vegetation corresponding to year 2002 and (2) a dynamical vegetation model that leaves the vegetation freely evolving. It has been found that, accounting for the phenology dynamics has opposite effects on both events, it damps the temperature anomaly in June, while it amplifies the temperature anomaly in August. The evolution of leaf area index in the two simulations reveals the early and fast development of agricultural vegetation in the simulation with freely evolving vegetation. The vegetation also decays earlier in 2003 than during normal years. This behavior has two consequences. In June, the larger foliage development, caused by higher springtime insolation, contributes to enhanced evapotranspiration and therefore land surface cooling which limit the temperature anomaly during the heat wave. This effect is not as visible in mountainous regions where the presence of forest and the absence of agriculture do not lead to the same modulation of the local water cycle. In August, the early leave fall and the critical soil moisture stress contribute to largely suppress evapotranspiration and to enhance sensible heat flux thus amplifying the temperature anomaly. The modulation of the temperature anomaly caused by the effect of interactive vegetation phenology can reach 1.5C for an average total anomaly of about 8C (i.e. 20%).

Vegetation Dynamics Enhancing Long-Term Climate Variability Confirmed by Two Models

AbstractTwo different coupled climate–vegetation models, the Community Climate Model version 3 coupled to the Integrated Biosphere Simulator (CCM3–IBIS) and the Laboratoire de Meteorologie Dynamique’s climate model coupled to the Organizing Carbon and Hydrology in Dynamic Ecosystems model (LMDz–ORCHIDEE), are used to study the effects of vegetation dynamics on climate variability. Two sets of simulations of the preindustrial climate are performed using fixed climatological sea surface temperatures: one set taking into account vegetation cover dynamics and the other keeping the vegetation cover fixed. Spectral analysis of the simulated precipitation and temperature over land shows that for both models the interactions between vegetation dynamics and the atmosphere enhance the low-frequency variability of the biosphere–atmosphere system at time scales ranging from a few years to a century. Despite differences in the magnitude of the signal between the two models, this confirms that vegetation dynamics intro...

What are the dominant features of rainfall leading to realistic large-scale crop yield simulations in West Africa?

[ 1] A large-scale crop model is forced by a range of climate datasets over West Africa to test the sensitivity of simulated yields to errors in input rainfall. The model skill, defined as the correlation between observed and simulated yield anomalies over 1968―1990 at the country scale, is used for assessment. We show that there are two essential rainfall features for the model to skillfully simulate interannual yield variability at the country scale: cumulative annual variability and frequency. At such a scale, providing additional information on intraseasonal variability, such as the chronology of rain events, does not improve the model skill. We suggest that such information is relevant at smaller spatial scales but is not spatially consistent enough to impact large-scale yield variability.