# Zaichun Zhu Back to [[Topics/Climate Change Science and Policy Debate/Climate Change Science and Policy Debate|Climate Change Science and Policy Debate]] · [[Topics/Climate Change Science and Policy Debate/Research and Evidence|Research and Evidence]] **Role:** Remote-sensing ecologist; lead author of the 2016 'Greening of the Earth' paper. - Lead author of **Zhu et al. 2016, "Greening of the Earth and its drivers"**, *Nature Climate Change* 6:791 ([doi](https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate3004)). - **Findings:** 25–50% of global vegetated land showed significant greening from 1982 to 2009. About 70% of it was attributed to CO₂ fertilisation, ~9% to nitrogen deposition, ~8% to climate change and ~4% to land-cover change. - Affiliation at the time: Peking University / Boston University ⚠️. - This is the "NASA satellite" greening evidence Clack cites. Here he cites it accurately; the omission is that greening does not offset other impacts. - Cited again, implicitly, in Clack's Oct 23 high-CO₂ epochs post ("vegetation growth and leaf expansion confirmed by NASA satellite observations"). See the [[Users/@PeterDClack/Post Analyses/Post Analysis - PeterDClack on High-CO2 Epochs and Biodiversity (2026-10-23)|Oct 23 high-CO₂ epochs analysis]].