Restoration of forests in medium latitudes can lead to stronger cooling of the atmosphere of the Earth, which suggest existing models, revealed researchers from China and the United States. The article of scientists has been published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Many specialists fear that the restoration of forests on average land latitudes – in particular, in North America and in Europe – can lead to increased global warming. Because of its low albedo, the reflection coefficient of light – forests absorb a large amount of solar radiation. In the tropics, the low albedo is compensated by a high level of carbon dioxide absorption with dense year-round green vegetation. In the moderate climate, the accumulated solar heat can “outweigh” the cooling effect from new forests.
However, in his new work, scientists from Princeton University and Nanjing University of Information Sciences and Technologies have shown that these concerns do not take into account the roles of forests in the formation of clouds that not only directly block the light from the sun, but also have a high albedo. The complexity of their research often leads to the fact that the clouds are excluded from the analyzes of the possible climate change. Researchers studied the influence of vegetation on the volume formation in medium latitudes, comparing satellite data on cloud coverage for 2001-2010 with models of plants and atmospheric interaction models.
It turned out that for this region, the cooling effect of the enhanced formation of clouds and the binding of carbon dioxide outweigh the effect from the absorption of solar radiation forests. Therefore, the restoration of forests, indicate specialists, will lead to stronger than previously thought, cooling effect for the land atmosphere.