Report: Divorce Toxic To The Environment

A recent Michigan State University study says the high rate of divorce is bad for the environment.

Although not groundbreaking in it’s conclusion, the report highlights an interesting relationship between social policy and environmental science.  It points out that two divorced households consume more water, energy and physical space than one married household.  Therefore, as divorce rates increase, so does the consumption of valuable resources and an overal degradation of the environment. 

“In the United States alone in 2005, divorced households used 73 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity and 627 billion gallons of water that could have been saved had household size remained the same as that of married households. Thirty-eight million extra rooms were needed with associated costs for heating and lighting,” Michigan State researchers Jianguo “Jack” Liu and Eunice Yu reported.

Liu, though, says environmental policy is more complicated than people often think, and policymakers need to consider divorce in the broader debate on environmental policy.

The report’s authors make an interesting point.  However, the author of this blog would also add that the toxic effects divorce have on the environment and all the other negative effects on society should be balanced against the toxic emotions on individuals and their children may suffer if they live in a loveless or high conflict household without seeking some intervention- up to an including in some instances, divorce.  

Read more about the study at The Huffington Post.