Development in Colorado and across the United States is transforming natural landscapes at the rate of two football fields per minute, a new analysis has found — raising concerns about survival of non-human species and potentially accelerated climate change.
The amount of natural land converted by human activities in Colorado increased by 676,827 acres between 2001 and 2017 — to about 10% of the state, an area larger than Rocky Mountain National Park, the analysis found. And the human footprint nationwide expanded by 24 million acres over those 16 years.
This rate of land conversion was faster than the deforestation altering the Amazon region of Brazil, where development in recent years devoured about two football fields every three minutes.
“In losing our natural landscapes, we’re losing a part of the American soul — especially in the West,” said biologist Brett Dickson, president of Conservation Science Partners, which conducted the analysis using satellite imagery, aerial photos, census surveys, energy infrastructure maps and other data.
“We’re eating away at our cherished landscapes. And we’re at risk of losing the places that provide Americans with things like clean water and landscapes for recreation that allow wildlife populations to persist and move freely,” Dickson said.
The analysis was commissioned by the Center for American Progress, a pro-conservation think tank based in Washington, D.C. Conservation Science Partners previously has conducted landscape studies focused on the West from its offices in California and Colorado. Those who worked on this project said the main forms of development modifying landscapes since 2001 include urban housing and commercial construction, road-building, agriculture, logging, grazing, oil and gas extraction, and the installation of pipelines.
Natural landscapes disappeared fastest in the South — 9 million acres, leaving 46% of the region covered by “human footprint” — and Midwest — 7.7 million acres, with a total of 59% of the region covered — according to the report. In the Northeast, development led to the loss of 1.1 million acres, putting 47% of the region under the “human footprint.”
Development in the West devoured an additional 6.7 million acres, with roughly 19% of the region now covered.
“Your observations of a new road, a higher fence, a longer commute might hit your gut, but are most likely fleeting. We have captured those events and carefully compiled them, mapping and measuring the extensive changes and rapid losses that have occurred recently to our natural landscapes,” said David Theobald, a Conservation Science Partners senior scientist.
Center for American Progress advocates proposed a goal of protecting 30% of all U.S. lands and oceans by 2030 to maintain ecological stability.
Unaltered natural landscapes help contain global warming because air pollution with heat-trapping greenhouse gases isn’t emitted and natural vegetation absorbs and stores carbon.
Landscape conversion also hammers non-human species. A United Nations-backed biodiversity and ecosystem science panel recently determined that about three-quarters of the land around the planet and two-thirds of marine environments have been altered significantly by human activity. An estimated 1 million plant and animal species face extinction.
Later this week, the UN-backed scientific Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is scheduled to unveil an analysis on the extent to which landscape change affects global warming. Nations of the world have resolved to work together toward containing global warming to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius above the levels before industrialization.
For years, scientists hypothesized that conserving at least half of the Earth’s surface in a natural state could help save 90% of species. An emerging coalition of scientists is recommending a commitment to conserve about a third of lands and oceans through formal protections by 2030.
U.S. governments traditionally supported robust conservation of natural landscapes.
“The United States is entering an era in which it will rely more than ever on the integrity and stability of the natural world to provide economic prosperity, safeguard the health of communities, and weather the effects of a changing climate,” Matt Lee-Ashley, a Center for American Progress senior fellow, wrote in a report urging a national conversation on how much nature the nation should preserve.
“With the nation’s dependence on the natural world growing,” he wrote, “now is the time to confront and reverse the rapid decline of its natural systems.”
