Contrasting Responses of Surface Heat Fluxes to Tropical Deforestation

Abstract

AbstractDeforestation alters the exchange of heat, moisture, and momentum between the Earth's surface and the atmosphere, which can significantly affect the surface energy balance and water budget. However, changes in surface heat fluxes in response to deforestation are diverse among multi‐model simulations. This study explores factors that might cause different changes in surface heat fluxes due to tropical deforestation with NCAR Community Land Model. The results show that the changes in surface heat fluxes are related to the mean‐state flux partitioning conditions over the deforested areas. Deforestation tends to decrease both surface heat fluxes under conditions with smaller evaporative fractions (EFs), and tends to decrease the latent heat fluxes and increase the sensible heat fluxes under conditions with greater EFs. A similar relation can be found in the Land Use Model Intercomparison Project, which indicates that the varying simulated flux partitioning conditions might contribute to the diverse changes in surface heat fluxes among models.