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A post at the Peak Generation blog discusses both the history behind the development of peak oil and similar attempts to look at exponential growth. The post notes that the distortions about the effort by M. King Hubbert are "nothing as to what has befallen the 1972 publication ofThe Limits to Growth, a best-selling paperback that grew out of meetings of an obscure global think tank, the Club of Rome. Limits to Growth is based upon computer modeling of global population, industrialization, pollution, food production and resource depletion, which, once again, shows that finite natural resources cannot endure indefinite exploitation."
Read the full post at Peak Generation
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The Environmentalist’s Guide to a Sensible Immigration Policy makes the connection between one of the most important issues facing Americans in their everyday lives — urban sprawl — and its principal cause: immigration-related population growth. All too often, so-called environmentalists pretend as if this connection does not exist. Can you imagine discussing the U.S. trade deficit without mentioning China? Or analyzing the looming Social Security crisis with no mention of retiring baby boomers? Well, that’s what is happening when environmentalists discuss the problem of urban sprawl or efforts to reduce U.S. CO2 emissions without mentioning immigration and its enormous impact on population growth.
The effects of population growth can not be denied, however we must approach the problems associated with population growth with intelliget and reasonable discourse and actions. While immigration is a part of the issue, it is not the whole cause. We can not realisticly build a barrier to stop all illegal entry into this country.
Therefore it is incumbent on all citizens to become informed about all the issues related to this problem. Solutions that profile ethnicity alone are at best wrong and at worst despicable. As a nation that came to be from immigration, we must not fall into that racial trap. It is not going to be easy and will require expenditure of funds but we must go forward together. Other countries must also be involved or we are doomed to failure. Thank you for taking the time to read my comments and I hope it is food for thought.
In his study “Rapid Population Growth in California: A Threat to Land and Food Production,” Cornell University professor Dr. David Pimentel writes that as the population continues to climb, food security and the ability to produce enough food so that Californians can lead healthy and productive lives will be significantly stressed. The future status of agricultural production is especially critical, because resources of cropland, clean water, adequate fossil energy, and abundant biodiversity are rapidly depleted throughout California, and indeed worldwide. Click here to download Dr. Pimentel’s eye opening study.
According to a report authored by FAIR’s Director of Special Projects Jack Martin entitled Immigration, Energy, and the Environment, Americans actually achieved more than a nine percent reduction in per capita energy consumption between 1973 and 2007. During that same time period, however, the U.S. population increased nearly 70 percent, with more than 31 percent of that increase directly attributable to legal immigration alone. In addition, the report notes that “the share of population growth attributable to immigration is still higher when illegal immigration and the children born to the immigrants after their arrival are included.” This population increase led to a 33 percent increase in American energy consumption from 1973 to 2007 — an increase that can be attributed primarily to U.S. population growth over that period.
With Congress and the Obama Administration considering an energy bill, wouldn’t it make sense for them to take into account the single largest contributing factor to greenhouse gas emissions over the past 35 years? Unfortunately, this hasn’t been the case. The House of Representatives recently passed the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, legislation more commonly referred to as “Cap-and-Trade.” The bill seeks to, among other things, “cap and reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” a move that supporters of the legislation suggest would help fight global climate change. However, the bill fails to address the principle cause of the problem it is seeking to solve: immigration generated population growth.
According to Immigration, Energy, and the Environment, “Any effort by the United States to reduce greenhouse gas emissions must take population growth into account.” The report goes on to point out that the central component of an energy policy that deals with population growth “must include an effective and enforceable immigration policy that curbs immigration levels to the point that it is no longer driving U.S. population growth.”
The report is available in its entirety here.
