Americans are living more densely, on average, than we were 20 years ago, but we’ve paved over the equivalent of more than five Yellowstone National Parks – or roughly eleven-and-a-half million acres during that same period of time. Some of that loss was due to regional differences in land consumption per person; a majority of … Continued

Auditory overload is an increasing public health concern, and it has been shown repeatedly that it is detrimental to our physical and mental health. Now, the problem has been recently linked to serious cardiovascular problems as it has been discovered that one in twenty heart attacks in cities can be linked to noise pollution. It … Continued

As reported in The Guardian, The United Nation’s Global Land Outlook, Second Edition report findings recently revealed that over 40% of the world’s land is now degraded. Degraded land is defined as that: …which has been depleted of natural resources, soil fertility, water, biodiversity, trees or native vegetation…” The report further explains that “degraded” land … Continued

From the vantage point of my desk, I observe people on the street walking with lunches from nearby restaurants, chatting on their cell phones, and toting packages or shopping bags. These mundane day-to-day activities are done without much thought, as they are part of our regular routines, but what we consume is a feature of … Continued

Satellite data show that in the last nine years, as a powerful drought held fast and river flows plummeted, the majority of the freshwater losses in the Basin — nearly 80 percent — came from water pumped out of aquifers. The decrease in groundwater reserves is a volume of water equivalent to one and a … Continued

Annually, the Global Footprint Network “measures a population’s demand for and ecosystems’ supply of resources and services” to inform us when during the course of a year we’ve reached overshoot – the point when we’ve used up what the Earth’s ecosystem has to give. That date this year is March 13 for the United States, … Continued

Buckeye, Arizona is one of the fastest growing cities in the country. There are numerous reasons why, but according to Rocket Mortgage, it’s in part because residents can “find a corner of town that feels like home in the Phoenix metro, which has a population of nearly five million people.” Between the small town charm … Continued

Buckeye, Arizona is one of the fastest growing cities in the country. There are numerous reasons why, but according to Rocket Mortgage, it’s in part because residents can “find a corner of town that feels like home in the Phoenix metro, which has a population of nearly five million people.” Between the small town charm … Continued

Immigration drives U.S. population growth, and this is true in western states, which are among some of the fastest growing areas in the United States. This growth is causing many strains on local resources and infrastructure, the most consequential being waters shortages that will become acute if current trends continue. For the first time, a … Continued