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Projection of vegetation impacts on future droughts over West Africa using a coupled RegCM-CLM-CN-DV

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Abstract

This study investigates the projected effect of vegetation feedback on drought conditions in West Africa using a regional climate model coupled with the National Center for Atmospheric Research Community Land Model, carbon–nitrogen (CN) module, and dynamic vegetation (DV) module (RegCM4.3.4-CLM-CN-DV). The role of vegetation feedback is examined based on simulations with and without the DV module. Simulations from four different global climate models are used as lateral boundary conditions for historical and future periods (historical: 1981–2000; future: 2081–2100). Using the standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index (SPEI), we quantify the frequency, duration, and intensity of droughts over two focal regions of the Sahel and the Guinea Coast in West Africa. With the dynamic vegetation (DV) considered, future droughts are expected to become more prolonged and enhanced over the Sahel. The drought is defined when the SPEI value is lower than the threshold (− 1) in the simulations with DV than those without DV. Over the Guinea Coast, the impact of DV is opposite compared with that over the Sahel. Additionally, we show that the simulated annual leaf area index associates well with annual minimum SPEI with the correlation coefficient up to 0.91, particularly over the Sahel, which is a transition zone, where land–atmosphere feedback is relatively strong. Results signify the importance of vegetation dynamics in predicting future droughts in West Africa, where the biosphere and atmosphere interactions play a significant role in the regional climate regime.

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Funding

This study was supported by the Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea, which was funded by the Ministry of Science, ICT & Future Planning (2020R1A2C2007670) and the Internationalization Infra Fund of Yonsei University (2018 Fall semester).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Yonsei University, Seoul, 03722, South Korea

    Muhammad Shafqat Mehboob, Yeonjoo Kim & Jaehyeong Lee

  2. Department of Civil Engineering, Kyonggi University, Suwon-si, Gyeonggi-do, 16227, South Korea

    Myoung-Jin Um

  3. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, 06269, USA

    Amir Erfanian & Guiling Wang

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  1. Muhammad Shafqat Mehboob
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  2. Yeonjoo Kim
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Correspondence to Yeonjoo Kim.

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Mehboob, M.S., Kim, Y., Lee, J. et al. Projection of vegetation impacts on future droughts over West Africa using a coupled RegCM-CLM-CN-DV. Climatic Change 163, 653–668 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-020-02879-z

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