Climate Change Trends and Impacts on Vegetation Greening Over the Tibetan Plateau

Abstract The Tibetan Plateau (TP) is an ecologically fragile region that is sensitive to climate change. In the context of global climate change, the climate change trends of the TP and the vegetation dynamic response need to be investigated. Based on in situ meteorological data, Satellite Pour l'Observation de la Terre vegetation data, and Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer land cover data, a comprehensive analysis was conducted to determine the trends of climate parameters in the TP region at different time scales (long term: 1960–2014; midterm: 1980–2014; short term 1999–2014). A consistent warming trend was observed for different temporal scales, while a warming slowdown was identified during 1999 and 2014. The warming rate was also shown to be much higher in the high‐altitude regions (>4,000 m), especially at midterm and short‐term time scales. A new cloud‐free time series of vegetation index data sets was reconstructed, and the vegetation density showed a general increasing trend along with a warming trend in the TP. The regions showing significant increases accounted for 7.63% of the total Tibetan territory. The major significant greening trend of the TP was mainly caused by climate factors. The reforestation projects may have played a minor role in the vegetation greening in specific regions of the TP. In addition, various vegetation types showed markedly different responses to climate changes. The grassland in semiarid regions, which accounted for 41.9% of the territory of the TP, was identified to be very sensitive to variations in both temperature and precipitation.