Cooling effects of increased green fodder area on native grassland in the northeastern Tibetan Plateau

摘要: With increasing livestock production due to high demand for consumption, the planted area of green fodder, an essential livestock supplement, has grown rapidly and will continue to grow in China. However, the climate feedback of this rapid land cover conversion is still unclear. Using multisource data (eg remote sensing observation and meteorological data), we compared the land surface temperature of green fodder plantation areas and native grassland in the northeastern Tibetan Plateau. The green fodder area was detected to be cooler than the native grassland by− 0.54±0.98 C in the daytime throughout the growing season. The highest magnitude (− 1.20±1.68 C) of cooling was observed in August. A nonradiative process, indicated by the energy redistribution factor, dominated the cooling effects compared to the radiative process altered by albedo variation. The results indicate the potential cooling effects of …