Regional and tele-connected impacts of the Tibetan Plateau surface darkening

Abstract

Despite knowledge of the presence of the Tibetan Plateau (TP) in reorganizing large-scale atmospheric circulation, it remains unclear how surface albedo darkening over TP will impact local glaciers and remote Asian monsoon systems. Here, we use a coupled land-atmosphere global climate model and a glacier model to address these questions. Under a high-emission scenario, TP surface albedo darkening will increase local temperature by 0.24 K by the end of this century. This warming will strengthen the elevated heat pump of TP, increasing South Asian monsoon precipitation while exacerbating the current “South Flood-North Drought” pattern over East Asia. The albedo darkening-induced climate change also leads to an accompanying TP glacier volume loss of 6.9%, which further increases to 25.2% at the equilibrium, with a notable loss in western TP. Our findings emphasize the importance of land-surface change responses in projecting future water resource availability, with important implications for water management policies.