Future warming accelerates lake variations in the Tibetan Plateau

Abstract

AbstractMounting evidence suggests that lakes in the Tibetan Plateau (TP) have been exposed to the dangers of climate warming. However, rare studies have been devoted to quantitatively estimating the contribution of climate warming to changes in lake ice phenology and lake expansion. Our results reveal a warmer future will further shorten lake ice duration in the TP and aggravate lake expansion in the Inner TP (ITP). Based on the statistical model and CMIP6 multimodel ensemble mean, the projected lake ice duration loss in the TP was presented. Specifically, the rising temperature in the cold season at the middle of the 21st century will lead to the generation of 22 ice‐free days and 29 ice‐free days in the scenarios of SSP2‐4.5 and SSP5‐8.5, respectively. While at the end of the 21st century, the average lake ice duration will decrease by 35 and 71 days, respectively, and some individual models indicate that a few lakes will no longer freeze in the scenario of SSP5‐8.5. Moreover, the results retrieved from the lake mass balance model simulation indicate that the increased precipitation in the warm season will yield the total lake expansion of approximately 8,000 and 9,000 km2 from 2015 to 2050 in the scenarios of SSP2‐4.5 and SSP5‐8.5, respectively. But the simulations suggest that lake expansion in the future is insensitive to the glacier mass loss. This study presents evidence to illustrate that the future warming will greatly impact the lake evolution in the TP and benefits for understanding of the TP cryosphere response to climate warming.