About every five feet, there was a body….it was the Hunger Games

By Jeremy Beck

“About every five feet, there was a body….it was the Hunger Games.” – Life in America’s National Parks, 2022 Three out of every four Americans feel an “emotional or spiritual uplift” from spending time in natural areas, and 85 percent of Americans say it is important to be able to access them. From our study: … Continued

U.S. projected to lose 18 million acres of farmland by 2060

By Jeremy Beck

America’s growing population is leading to the unilateral loss of farmland to make way for housing, office parks, shopping plazas, and more. The looming paradox is that as development consumes farmland to accommodate more people, the demand for food also grows. America’s capacity to provide basic resources (water, food, fiber) to its citizens is on … Continued

More density and less open space

By Jeremy Beck

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

Growing Demands on a Strained Commodity

By Admins

In some positive news, our country’s overall aggregate water usage has decreased over the past few decades despite our population growth. Yet, this has not changed the sobering reality that we are continuing to deplete our finite water supply. Ultimately, growing demands are being placed on an already strained commodity. Our National Sprawl Study reports: … Continued

Same Story, Different Countries: Immigration is Driving Population Growth

By Admins

Exorbitantly high levels of immigration driving population growth, ultimately affecting quality of life issues, is not unique to the United States. Concern for job opportunities, housing, the preservation of natural resources, as they relate to one’s well-being, are expressed in a recent article by Clare Foges titled, “How much immigration can Britain sustain?” This article, … Continued

“Is My Country Sustainable?”

By Jeremy Beck

Contra Elon Musk, ecological sustainability isn’t a question of how many people a land mass can contain, but how many it can sustain. People can go just about anywhere for short periods of time, but if they want to put down roots and maintain a certain standard of living they are going to need large … Continued

We need to listen to the facts over all the noise

By Admins

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

Growing Food for a Growing Population: Paving Over Open Space Makes that a Challenge

By Christy Shaw

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

Overshoot Day…already

By Admins

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