The Myths of the Green Movement

The New York Post reports:

What are the myths propagated by the Church of Environmentalism? Consider the pronouncements from the greens' "Vatican": Last Earth Day, Greenpeace USA exhorted its followers to action because "our forests are being destroyed at an unprecedented rate." More, we must switch to "clean alternative" energies like wind power, because "we all know that fossil fuels contribute to global warming."

A lot of people agree. Nearly 67 percent of those in our survey said they believe human activity, such as logging and development, is shrinking our forests. It seems self-evident; after all, the population continues to grow, and we build more and bigger buildings. So why wouldn't we be losing forestland?

But it's not so. Yes, the United States lost forestland throughout much of the 19th century, as the new nation grew - but the amount of forestland stabilized throughout much of the 20th century.

You can thank technology and progress for that, not any government scheme to save trees. The fact is that our footprint over nature is shrinking - because housing and industry don't require anything approaching the acreage that farming demands, and we now need smaller and smaller spaces to provide the necessities of life.

Machines have replaced work animals (also cutting down the land needed for grazing). Crops deliver richer yields in smaller spaces. Today we harvest 80 million fewer acres of cropland than we did 60 years ago. And our overall per-capita timber consumption is half of what it was a century ago.

Result? According to the Forest Service, we have actually seen a net reforestation since 1985. We aren't losing forestland, we're gaining it.

The Green Movement sure is a popular religion.