Divorce Hurts the Planet

[urban-hermit]

Another sign from God! Yay for the Catholic Church

ncregister.com/site/article/7592/

You can only read this link if you subscribe to the National Catholic Register. …

But basically the idea is that since divorce splits a single household into 2 households (2 houses, 2 furnaces, 2 dishwashers, double the lightbulbs, etc.) that it more than wipes out any gains you might make by using hi-efficiency lightbulbs and recycling and not flushing the toilet except once a week and stuff like that.

“If you have two parents and five children in a room, they’re all getting the same benefit from one light bulb, one TV, the heating system in the house,” Liu said. “When a divorce occurs, at least two of all those things are needed for the same people.”

…

But don’t expect those thousands of global warming websites and brochures to begin adding “avoid divorce” or “take marriage seriously” to the lists that say “ride a bike,” “drive a hybrid car” or “use energy efficient light bulbs.”

“People doing research on environmental issues are very surprised by this, and they don’t realize the connection between divorce and the environment,” Liu said. “Even people who care very deeply about the environment don’t make this connection.”

 

[Dale_M]

hmmm… Maggie Gallagher, president of the Washington-based Institute for Marriage and Public Policy, makes some good observations:

“The logic of the study suggests that divorced fathers would help the environment by abandoning their children, rather than driving across town to see them,” she said. “It would suggest that unmarried couples are better to live together rather than to date and maintain separate households. To endorse this study I’d have to endorse the underlying assumption that we should define the problem of global warming as anything that increases the number of people or houses on the planet.”

 

[manualman]

This is no surprise to me. I do residential land development. I forget the precise statistics, but the ratio of urbanized area per capita has zoomed ENORMOUSLY in the past 30 years. Divorce is one of the primary reasons.

30 years ago, the typical American family had 4-5 people and occupied a 1,500 to 1,800 SF home on 1/5 to 1/4 acre of land (new home sales). Now you have 2-3 people on average living in 2,300 to 3,000 SF homes on 1/4 to 1/3 acre lots (today’s new home sales).

This sure isn’t energy efficiency progress.