Amplified local cooling effect of forestation in warming Europe.

ABSTRACT: Forests exhibit local cooling or warming effects compared to adjacent openlands through biophysical processes. These temperature effects are predicted by earth system models to evolve in response to climate change. However, such temporal patterns remain unconstrained by observations and have not been detected in historical records. Here, by comparing the satellite observations of spatially nearby forests and openlands over the last two decades, we quantify temporal trends in local land surface temperature (LST) effects of forest change in Europe. During winter, the daytime warming effect of potential forestation weakens and reverses to cooling (-0.142 K/decade) with decreasing snow cover, as forests show less pronounced surface darkening trends than openlands. During summer, the daytime co

SUBMITTER: Li Y 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12462431 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature