Wetlands Cool Land Surface Temperature in Tropical Regions but Warm in Boreal Regions

• Main Authors: Yuxuan Wu, Yi Xi, Maoyuan Feng, Shushi Peng
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2021-04-01
• Series: Remote Sensing
• Subjects: wetlands; land surface temperature; surface energy balance; albedo; evapotranspiration; remote sensing
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/13/8/1439

Wetlands play a critical role in global hydrological and biogeochemical cycles. Regulating the regional climate is one of the most important ecosystem services of natural wetlands. However, the impact of wetlands on local temperature on the global scale and the attribution is still unclear. This study utilizes the satellite-based products (land surface temperature (LST), albedo, and evapotranspiration (ET)) to evaluate the difference in LST between wetlands and their adjacent landcover types and the possible drivers. Here we show that on average for the whole year, wetlands have a cooling effect in tropical regions, but have a warming effect in boreal regions. The impacts of wetlands on LST show great seasonality in the boreal regions; i.e., the wetlands have a warming effect in winter but a cooling effect in summer. The difference in albedo and ET between wetlands and the other landcover types only interprets 30% of temporal variation of the difference in LST. Due to the large water storage in wetlands, the ground heat flux (G) may interpret the rest of the impact, absorbing energy in summer and releasing energy in winter in wetlands, which has often been neglected in previous studies. Our results indicate that it is critical to comprehensively consider the effects of wetland restoration in different regions to realize potential climatic benefits in the future.