Study Says Divorce is Bad for Environment

Divorces aren't just hard for people, they apparently can also can hurt the environment. That's a finding of a new study published in the "Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States.".

According to researchers from Michigan State University, Eunice Yu and Jack Liu, the reason is simple: when couples live separately, they consume more resources.

For example - if a family ends up with two houses or apartments, two refrigerators, two heating systems and two air conditioners - that is less energy-efficient than having everyone under one roof, because it costs the same to heat an apartment whether there's one person in it, or four. And a refrigerator runs all day, whether there's food for a family or a single person. The researchers say divorce may be one reason the number of houses around the world has been growing faster than the population.

While that seems basic enough, the researchers looked at the sizes of households in the U.S and several other countries and the use of resources. And they added up that wasted energy.

According to their findings, the average size of a divorced family that split into two households is 27-41 percent smaller than a married household in 12 countries, between 1998 and 2002. They said "if divorced households had combined to have the same average household size as married households, there could have been 7.4 million fewer households in these countries."

The impact on people's pocketbook may be easier to understand. Their research added up the cost of all the electricity for split households, and they found that in 2005 in the U.S. "divorced households spent 46% and 56% more on electricity and water per person than married households." The authors say if divorced families in the U.S. had been as efficient as married households, in 2005, they would have saved 73 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity and 627 million gallons of water.

The authors say divorces are "increasingly common around the world". However, they say little research has been done on the environmental impact when a couple, or family splits up. They say people need to learn to use their resources more efficiently.

They also say empty-nesters who stay in their house after their children leave can have the same effect. And if someone remarries and forms a new household, the researchers say they generally increase their household size and reduce the use of resources.

Liu tells the Los Angeles Times, the research is not meant to tell people whether to get a divorce, they're just presenting facts regarding the environment.