Christmas Tree Cultivation - Environmental Effect

Environmental Effect

In the United States, the National Christmas Tree Association (NCTA) promotes the environmental benefits of live Christmas trees over the competing artificial alternative. The NCTA stated that every acre of Christmas trees in production produced the daily oxygen requirement for 18 people; with 500,000 acres (200,000 ha) in production in the U.S. alone, that amounts to oxygen for 9 million people per day. The NCTA also stated that the farms help to stabilize the soil, protect water supplies and provide wildlife habitat. In addition, the industry points to the reduction of carbon dioxide through Christmas tree farming. An independent Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) study, conducted by a firm of experts in sustainable development, states that a natural tree will generate 3.1 kg of greenhouse gases whereas the artificial tree will produce 8.1 kg per year.

A 1998 report from the Michigan State University Agricultural Experiment Station predicted increasing environmental concerns about tree production and use as one possible reason people may favor artificial trees in the future. The report cited the use of fertilizers and pesticides and increasing concerns regarding tree disposal as the chief elements in its prediction. Critics of tree farming have raised the concerns highlighted in the 1998 report, as well as other issues, such as the effect that large-scale tree farming operations have on biodiversity. Pesticide use on Christmas tree farms is one of the main concerns of environmentalists; fir trees are vulnerable to a wide array of pests and diseases which requires the use of pesticides and other chemicals including the widely-used herbicide glyphosate (brand name Roundup). Glyphosate is commonly used in Christmas tree production in the U.S. state of North Carolina, where studies have found traces of agricultural chemicals in homes and tree industry workers' urine samples. The average Christmas tree receives roughly a half of an ounce (14 g) of pesticide over its lifetime.

The BBC's "Gardening" website called buying Christmas trees directly from the farm, "the most environmentally friendly way of getting a tree". Other positive environmental attributes have been given live Christmas trees as well. Researchers at the University of Nebraska included the reuse of natural Christmas trees as mulch and, in larger quantities, piled up as soil erosion barriers, among the benefits of live tree use. Other positive reuses included fish habitat in private ponds and backyard bird feeders.

In 2002, overgrown Christmas trees were used in a project to restore a 1,200-foot (370 m) long section of severely eroded riverbank along the Connecticut River at the Birch Meadow Farm in Fairlee, Vermont. As part of the project, overgrown, 20–40 feet (6.1–12 m) Christmas trees were used to help create a revetment at the site in order to deflect the river current away from the restoration work site. The trees were placed in the river, with their tips pointed downstream, protected by a small rock tie back and cabled into the riverbank. After the trees were in place various plants were rooted among their branches.