Thu Oct 08, F. Flechtner
• Sorted by Date • Sorted by Last Name of First Author •
Ma, Yifei, Wu, Qiaoli, Chen, Shaoyuan, Song, Jinling, and Jiang, Jie, 2026. Asynchronous Responses of Ecosystem Carbon Gain and Groundwater Storage Under Ecological Restoration in the Loess Plateau. Remote Sensing, 18(16):2822, doi:10.3390/rs18162822.
• from the NASA Astrophysics Data System • by the DOI System •
@ARTICLE{2026RemS...18.2822M,
author = {{Ma}, Yifei and {Wu}, Qiaoli and {Chen}, Shaoyuan and {Song}, Jinling and {Jiang}, Jie},
title = "{Asynchronous Responses of Ecosystem Carbon Gain and Groundwater Storage Under Ecological Restoration in the Loess Plateau}",
journal = {Remote Sensing},
keywords = {Loess Plateau, ecological restoration, ecosystem carbon gain, evapotranspiration, water-use efficiency, groundwater storage anomaly, asynchronous response},
year = 2026,
month = aug,
volume = {18},
number = {16},
eid = {2822},
pages = {2822},
abstract = "{What are the main findings? During 2002--2023, GPP increased
substantially faster than ET, with relative growth rates of
1.66\% and 0.47\%, respectively, resulting in a significant
increase in WUE. XGBoost--SHAP analysis showed that LAI had the
strongest model-based association with GPP and WUE, whereas ET
was jointly associated with LAI, air temperature, and
precipitation. Middle- and deep-layer soil moisture showed an
increasing tendency during 2016--2023, whereas regional
groundwater storage declined markedly during 2002--2020 and
showed only a short-term, nonsignificant increase during 2020--
2023. During 2002--2023, GPP increased substantially faster than
ET, with relative growth rates of 1.66\% and 0.47\%,
respectively, resulting in a significant increase in WUE.
XGBoost--SHAP analysis showed that LAI had the strongest model-
based association with GPP and WUE, whereas ET was jointly
associated with LAI, air temperature, and precipitation. Middle-
and deep-layer soil moisture showed an increasing tendency
during 2016--2023, whereas regional groundwater storage declined
markedly during 2002--2020 and showed only a short-term,
nonsignificant increase during 2020--2023. What are the
implications of the main findings? Ecological restoration was
accompanied by increased ecosystem carbon gain and WUE without a
proportional increase in annual ET, while improvements in
surface carbon--water conditions did not translate into
synchronous groundwater recovery. Integrating multi-source
remote sensing, land-surface assimilation, GRACE/GRACE-FO, and
human water-use datasets provides useful evidence for optimizing
ecological restoration and groundwater management. Ecological
restoration was accompanied by increased ecosystem carbon gain
and WUE without a proportional increase in annual ET, while
improvements in surface carbon--water conditions did not
translate into synchronous groundwater recovery. Integrating
multi-source remote sensing, land-surface assimilation,
GRACE/GRACE-FO, and human water-use datasets provides useful
evidence for optimizing ecological restoration and groundwater
management. Since the implementation of the Grain-for-Green
Program (GGP), vegetation across the Loess Plateau (LP) has
substantially recovered. However, whether the associated
increase in ecosystem carbon gain was accompanied by a
proportional increase in water consumption and whether
groundwater storage changed synchronously remain unclear. This
study integrated multi-source remote sensing products, GLDAS-
Noah land-surface assimilation data, GRACE/GRACE-FO satellite
gravimetry, irrigation water-use data, provincial water-use
statistics, and coal-resource information to examine long-term
changes in gross primary productivity (GPP), evapotranspiration
(ET), water-use efficiency (WUE), soil moisture (SM), and
groundwater storage anomaly (GWSA) during 2002--2023. GPP
increased significantly by 10.67 g C m$^{-2}$ yr$^{-1}$ (p0.01),
whereas ET increased more modestly by 1.97 mm yr$^{-1}$ (p0.05).
The relative growth rate of GPP (1.66\%) was approximately 3.5
times that of ET (0.47\%), and WUE increased by 0.018 g C
m$^{-2}$ mm$^{-1}$ yr$^{-1}$ (p0.01). In the XGBoost--SHAP
models for 2004--2019, LAI showed the strongest model-based
association with GPP and WUE, whereas ET was associated more
broadly with LAI, air temperature, and precipitation. SM
declined during 2002--2015 but showed an increasing tendency
during 2016--2023, particularly in the middle and deep layers.
The long-term GWSA slopes derived from CSR and JPL were -8.707
and -9.505 mm yr$^{-1}$, respectively, and the averaged CSR--JPL
GWSA series showed a Sen's slope of -9.131 mm yr$^{-1}$. GWSA
declined during 2002--2020 and showed only a short-term,
nonsignificant increase during 2020--2023 (4.110 mm yr$^{-1}$,
p>0.05). These contrasting trajectories indicate that increases
in surface carbon uptake and improvements in soil-water
conditions were not accompanied by synchronous regional
groundwater recovery. Overall, the ecological-restoration period
was accompanied by increased carbon gain and WUE without a
proportional increase in regional ET, while groundwater storage
followed a distinct trajectory. These findings provide regional-
scale evidence and a quantitative basis for coordinating
sustainable water-resource management with ecological-
restoration optimization on the LP.}",
doi = {10.3390/rs18162822},
adsurl = {https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2026RemS...18.2822M},
adsnote = {Provided by the SAO/NASA Astrophysics Data System}
}
Generated by
bib2html_grace.pl
(written by Patrick Riley
modified for this page by Volker Klemann) on
Thu Oct 08, 2026 16:44:00
GRACE-FO
Thu Oct 08, F. Flechtner