Population Growth and the Environment
Unrestricted population growth is having a negative effect on the U.S. population and environment.
Fast Facts
- New immigrants and their U.S.-born children currently make up 75 to 80 percent of our annual population growth.
- Our country’s population is estimated to increase by approximately 77 million people – from 327 million in 2019 to 404 million in 2060 – in only four decades.
- Forty-four percent of all U.S. land area is used as productive land or to support agriculture. However, this percentage is declining due to suburban development.
- In spite of the impact of mass immigration on the environment, America’s leading environmentalist groups remain silent.
Population and Environment Effects of Immigration
Unrestricted population growth is having a negative effect on the U.S. population and environment. New immigrants and their U.S.- born children currently make up 75 to 80 percent of our annual population growth. The consequences are most visible in the nation’s water supply, agriculture, biodiversity, energy usage, forests, land use, and sprawl.
- The lack of affordable fresh water has led some towns to halt development. Local solutions seem inadequate to address the national problem, which stems from unsustainable immigration policies.
- According to the EPA, immigration-driven population growth also impacts water pollution.
- 40 percent of all U.S. land area is used as productive land or to support agriculture. However, this percentage is declining due to suburban development.
- Biodiversity is under threat with human population now appropriating half of the continental U.S. for its sustenance, resulting in native species with increasingly degraded ecosystems.
- Increasing energy consumption is closely correlated to population growth, resulting in a growing release of greenhouse gases and fuel spills.
- America’s total forest cover has declined by a third since European colonization. The effects of unrestricted population growth are adding to that decline.
- Across America, cities are challenged to cope with the effects of overpopulation-induced urban crowding and sprawl. Only the federal government can lawfully adopt measures aimed at stabilizing the population by curtailing mass immigration.