Abstract
Dust storms represent a major environmental challenge in northern China, adversely affecting air quality, agricultural productivity, and energy supply. However, the drivers behind recent changes in dust storm activity remain poorly understood. By analyzing 39 years of dust storm observations (957 stations), remote sensing, and reanalysis data (1982–2020), we document a significant decline in annual dust storm frequency (−0.490 days·decade⁻¹; p < 0.05), most pronounced in northwestern China. Concurrently, vegetation cover expanded (annual NDVI increase: 0.100 decade⁻¹), exhibiting a strong negative correlation with dust activity (r = −0.616; p < 0.01). Sensitivity experiments conducted with the physically-based Dust Emission Model (DuEMv1) further indicate that enhanced vegetation cover weakens dust activity, suggesting that vegetation greening plays a key role in suppressing dust storms. This also suggests that vegetation greening has the potential to mitigate dust storms in dryland regions, with implications for ecosystem restoration under a warming climate.
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Acknowledgements
This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (42330502, 42101027), Qinghai Provincial Central Government-Guided Local Science and Technology Development Fund—Science and Technology Innovation Base Construction Project(2025ZY017) and Independent Research Project of State Key Laboratory of Earth Surface Processes and Resource Ecology at Beijing Normal University. C.A-M. acknowledges support from the GVA-PROMETEO Grant CIPROM/2023/38; CSIC-LINCGLOBAL Ref. 598 LINCG24042; and CSIC’s PTI-Clima.
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Wang, Y., Shi, P., Azorin-Molina, C. et al. Vegetation greening reduces dust storm activity in northern China. npj Nat. Hazards (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44304-026-00220-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s44304-026-00220-9
