Table 1 Data types, processes and sources.

Land use data

30 m

Data for 1990, 1995, 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020

The Resource and Environment Science Data Center, Chinese Academy of Sciences (http://www.resdc.cn)

DEM

30 m

The study area DEM was extracted via ArcGIS 10.8 software

The NASA-released SRTM global DEM (https://lpdaac.usgs.gov/)

Precipitation

Point data

Data for 1990, 1995, 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020

The China Meteorological Data Network (http://data.cma.cn/)

Temperature

River distribution

100 m

Data for 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020

The Resource and Environment Science Data Center, Chinese Academy of Sciences (https://www.resdc.cn)

Road distribution

100 m

Data for 2000, 2010, and 2020

Soil type data

1000 m

The study area soil type data was extracted via ArcGIS 10.8 software

Population density

1000 m

Data for 1990, 1995, 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020

GDP

1000 m

Mining industry data

Point data

Data for 1990–2020

The statistical yearbooks of the study area’s municipalities and counties for the years 1990–2020

Nighttime light brightness

500 m

Data for 1990, 1995, 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020

The National Tibetan Plateau Environment Data Center (https://data.tpdc.ac.cn)