Is A Real Or Fake Christmas Tree Better For The Environment?

The Daily Green:

For many families, the centerpiece of Christmas celebrations is the luminous, awe-inspiring tree set up with care in the living room. But with all the options now available, how do you know which Christmas tree is the greenest choice for the environment?

Read the whole story: The Daily Green

Comments

[ZDuck]

09:42 AM on 12/07/2010

No dead trees. We get a potted tree and plant it after the holidays. The trees we plant grow well outside. Unfortunately when we moved, all 15 trees were cut down by the new owner.

[ThinkCreeps]

09:12 AM on 12/07/2010

Aren't old christmas trees an excellent source of renewable heat?

[JCCross]

10:14 PM on 12/06/2010

How about NO Christmas tree? Either Christmas is in your heart, or it's nowhere. You don't need a tree to celebrate the birth of the baby Jesus! If you HAVE to have a tree, decorate the one growing in your front yard!

[SaddieMcCall]

03:42 AM on 12/07/2010

I haven't had a tree in several decades. I have better things to do with my money than to spend it on a tree and decorations. Like donating the money to charity for something more practical than a tree. I have never tried to convince anyone else to not have a tree, or tell them how to spend their money - yet every year when I get the inevitable question - Have you set up your tree yet? The reaction I get from people when they hear that I don't want a tree is insane. They take it as a personal attack that I chose not to go along with the crowd and accuse me of ruining Christmas.

[Issaquah79]

08:06 PM on 12/06/2010

I have only used a real tree from a tree farm once. Of course I knew the tree was dead but when it turned brown and shriveled up that's when the guilt hit me. I loved the presence of that tree in my home and felt like a JERK for having been a part of it dying for some stupid tradition. From then on my husband and I have had only living trees in our home. We plant them the following spring on our property. It's feels wonderful to not hurt the trees and I get to help the environment in so many ways by planting them. Yes, you have to be careful and it can only be in your home 7-10 days but it's worth it! For the last 8 years every single living tree we have brought in our home has survived. Yes, I'm a cow hugging, tree worshipper and PROUD of it.

[Uproar]

07:10 PM on 12/06/2010

Even though a fake tree is produced with chemicals, I'd think that is better because you can buy one, and keep it for 20 years. Fake trees made 40 eyars ago haven't changed, and look the same today. Better than cutting down a live tree every year, and throwing it away. You can't even use the wood for anything.

[Waterphoneman]

05:14 PM on 12/06/2010

Grow your own Christmas tree in a container and move it inside for Christmas and outside for the rest of the year. You get the oxygen and nothing has to be cut down. Plastic trees in your house give off gases that are not healthy to breathe.

[gettymuse]

03:34 PM on 12/05/2010

This is such a good question. First are we using the tree in the right way for symbolism, or are we smarter now to not cut down trees that diminish our oxygen needed on our planet? Each Christmas we cut down so many trees and then throw them away. Perhaps prayer and the symbolism has a greater meaning than the need to breath fresh air forevermore, yet I think plastic is worse. Still someday we should just decorate the trees outside or the kind of trees we can plant after Christmas. This was how I always was raised, there, was dirt underneath the tree, and it usually came from my own forrest. I know a lot of people don
t have a lot of pine trees to dig up and replant each year, but it's not so bad.

[onalimb]

12:49 PM on 12/05/2010

Good article.
Next please evaluate solar powered tree lights.

[Zachary Fisk]

10:14 AM on 12/05/2010

I prefer to buy a local tree that I cut myself. The advantage I see is that this choice prevents the land from growing houses and pavement. During the trees growth it also provides habitat.

[wm1066]

03:45 PM on 12/04/2010

My cousin was allergic to the real trees so my mother macramed a tree, it was pretty cool. She made one for me twenty years ago and I still have it. She had a plate at the base and the macrame went around it and formed the tree structure to the top. She had openings on the sides for ornaments. Hers was made of thick white cable yarn.

[OkieMon]

11:03 AM on 12/04/2010

use a live tree and then plant it in your yard.....

[deepintheheartoftejas]

05:58 PM on 12/05/2010

My parents used to try this every Christmas. None of them ever survived for long after a month indoors, and then being transplanted outside.

[mothergrace]

03:17 AM on 12/04/2010

One thing not mentioned in the article is that young trees take up a LOT of carbon. If they aren't burned they serve as a way to sequester the carbon for years and serve as a sink for CO2.

Just another thing to think about. :)

[paintitblack]

03:39 AM on 12/05/2010

Please tell me you aren't seriously suggesting that young trees are harmful to the environment. Face...palm.

[mothergrace]

02:55 PM on 12/05/2010

No. Just the opposite. Most Christmas trees are less than 10 years old. They take up a lot of carbon in their early growing years and if the tree is mulched (not burned) they hold onto the carbon. (The carbon is released very slowly as the mulch decomposes but not all at once as it would if burned.)

All the other factors still have to be considered but if you wanted to get a fresh tree every year and turn it in for composting it is actually a good thing to keep growing more and more young trees for this purpose.

[JScott]

05:46 PM on 12/03/2010

I"ve heard the latest is to 'rent' a real tree in a pot, if you like it you can rent the same tree next year.