TY - JOUR
T1 - Projecting impacts of climate change on global terrestrial ecoregions
AU - Yu, Deyong
AU - Liu, Yupeng
AU - Shi, Peijun
AU - Wu, Jianguo
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was supported by the Fund for Creative Research Groups of National Natural Science Foundation of China ( 41621061 ), and the Program of National Natural Science Foundation of China ( 41571170 ).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 Elsevier Ltd
PY - 2019/8
Y1 - 2019/8
N2 - Terrestrial ecoregions, including critical ecoregions (CEs), vulnerable ecoregions (VEs), and intact ecoregions (IEs) have been used by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) to classify global biodiversity and are being affected by climate change, which was considered as one of the main threats to biodiversity conservation. However, the impacts of future climate change in shifted means and extremes of temperature, precipitation, and cloud cover under the representative concentration pathways (RCP 2.6, 4.5, and 8.5) on the characteristics of these ecoregions have yet to be fully understood. The present study was designed using a dynamic global vegetation model and both current and future climate scenarios, to investigate the impacts of shifted means and extremes of temperature, precipitation, and cloud cover on five ecological indicators including net primary productivity (NPP), carbon storage, runoff, wildfire risk, and habitat transformation at the ecoregional scale. The analysis was performed for the terrestrial ecoregions as a whole, as well as for specific subsets of CEs, VEs, and IEs. The results showed that future climate scenarios (whether RCP 2.6, 4.5, or 8.5) were estimated to increase the mean NPP, runoff, wildfire risk, and habitat transformation for all ecoregion types, when comparing values for 2071–2100 to the baseline (1971–2000) period. In contrast, the mean carbon storage in the TEWs, VEs, and CEs was estimated to decrease from the baseline to the values under RCP 2.6 and RCP 4.5 and then increase to their largest values under RCP 8.5. The mean carbon storage in the IEs under RCP 8.5 was estimated to remain lower than the baseline period values. Climate change in shifted means and extremes of temperature, precipitation, and cloud cover are generally significant drivers of the variances of NPP, carbon storage, runoff, wildfire risk, and habitat transformation under RCP 2.6, RCP 4.5, and RCP 8.5. The dynamics of the climate change metrics and the five ecological indicators have significant implications for biodiversity conservation in changing climates.
AB - Terrestrial ecoregions, including critical ecoregions (CEs), vulnerable ecoregions (VEs), and intact ecoregions (IEs) have been used by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) to classify global biodiversity and are being affected by climate change, which was considered as one of the main threats to biodiversity conservation. However, the impacts of future climate change in shifted means and extremes of temperature, precipitation, and cloud cover under the representative concentration pathways (RCP 2.6, 4.5, and 8.5) on the characteristics of these ecoregions have yet to be fully understood. The present study was designed using a dynamic global vegetation model and both current and future climate scenarios, to investigate the impacts of shifted means and extremes of temperature, precipitation, and cloud cover on five ecological indicators including net primary productivity (NPP), carbon storage, runoff, wildfire risk, and habitat transformation at the ecoregional scale. The analysis was performed for the terrestrial ecoregions as a whole, as well as for specific subsets of CEs, VEs, and IEs. The results showed that future climate scenarios (whether RCP 2.6, 4.5, or 8.5) were estimated to increase the mean NPP, runoff, wildfire risk, and habitat transformation for all ecoregion types, when comparing values for 2071–2100 to the baseline (1971–2000) period. In contrast, the mean carbon storage in the TEWs, VEs, and CEs was estimated to decrease from the baseline to the values under RCP 2.6 and RCP 4.5 and then increase to their largest values under RCP 8.5. The mean carbon storage in the IEs under RCP 8.5 was estimated to remain lower than the baseline period values. Climate change in shifted means and extremes of temperature, precipitation, and cloud cover are generally significant drivers of the variances of NPP, carbon storage, runoff, wildfire risk, and habitat transformation under RCP 2.6, RCP 4.5, and RCP 8.5. The dynamics of the climate change metrics and the five ecological indicators have significant implications for biodiversity conservation in changing climates.
KW - Biodiversity conservation
KW - Climatic extreme
KW - Dynamic vegetation model
KW - Ecological risk
KW - Ecosystem service
KW - Shifted climatic mean
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U2 - 10.1016/j.ecolind.2019.04.006
DO - 10.1016/j.ecolind.2019.04.006
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85063964468
SN - 1470-160X
VL - 103
SP - 114
EP - 123
JO - Ecological Indicators
JF - Ecological Indicators
ER -