{"id":22399,"date":"2012-12-18T11:56:51","date_gmt":"2012-12-18T17:56:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/?p=22399"},"modified":"2012-12-18T13:49:49","modified_gmt":"2012-12-18T19:49:49","slug":"reader-response-real-vs-artificial-christmas-trees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/12\/18\/reader-response-real-vs-artificial-christmas-trees\/","title":{"rendered":"Reader Response: Real vs Artificial Christmas Trees"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_22421\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 300px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/12\/18\/reader-response-real-vs-artificial-christmas-trees\/8271751769_9fa077c634_c\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-22421\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-22421\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/12\/8271751769_9fa077c634_c-300x225.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/12\/8271751769_9fa077c634_c-300x225.jpeg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/12\/8271751769_9fa077c634_c-620x465.jpeg 620w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/12\/8271751769_9fa077c634_c.jpeg 800w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Ruben Holthuijsen \/ Flickr<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Many Americans opt for fake trees like this one during the holiday season.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Here&#8217;s a little known fact: fake Christmas trees were invented to help the environment. The first artificial trees were created in Germany in the 19th century. Made of goose feathers painted green, the trees were intended to prevent deforestation, <a href=\"http:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=CXdxIt-ZBFgC&amp;pg=PA34&amp;dq=aluminum+christmas+trees&amp;lr=&amp;client=firefox-a#v=onepage&amp;q=aluminum%20christmas%20trees&amp;f=false\">according to researcher James Hewitt<\/a>. \u00a0These days trees are made of metal and plastic and shipped in from China, prompting a lot of people to worry about their environmental impact.<\/p>\n<p>Last week we reported on<a href=\"http:\/\/www.christmastreeassociation.org\/pdf\/ACTA%20Christmas%20Tree%20LCA%20Final%20Report%20November%202010.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">\u00a0a recent study<\/a>\u00a0that said those concerns were overblown.\u00a0Although, a lot can be done to lessen the impact of either fake or real trees, the reality is that either of the two options has less of an environmental impact than the typical daily actions of someone in the United States.<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>The study says,<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>&#8220;The impact of the tree life cycle, for all scenarios, is less than 0.1% of a person\u2019s annual carbon footprint and therefore is negligible within the context of the average American\u2019s lifestyle.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>A lot of you had problems with the study or were looking for more information. We decided to follow up with some of your burning questions. Here&#8217;s a look at your responses to the &#8220;settled&#8221; debate about the impact of holiday trees.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>http:\/\/storify.com\/elizTrovall\/reader-response-real-vs-artificial-tree<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Choosing the most environmentally-friendly tree might be an easier choice than you think. StateImpact Texas reports on the carbon footprint of real and artificial trees. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":130,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[58],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22399"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/130"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22399"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22399\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}