Trees are an essential part of every day life. They provide people with fresh oxygen using the carbon dioxide that people breath out, they give people shelter and materials to build with, and they also lower the ambient temperature as much as 10°F, keeping our environment a cooler place (Science Daily). But there’s a problem, Earth’s tree population is rapidly dropping as the human population keeps rising.

This presents the human population with a massive amount of problems. According to a recent study done by The US Forest Service, it has been discovered that over a five-year period, we have lost 36 million trees annually from urban and rural communities. That’s a 1% drop from 2009 to 2014.

Senior US Forest Service scientist and co-author of this study, David Nowak, says that if we continue on this path, “Cities will become warmer, more polluted and generally more unhealthy for inhabitants.”

Nowak claims that there are multiple reasons why the tree population is declining. Some of these reasons include hurricanes, tornadoes, fires, insects and disease. But the main reason for our tree loss, in which humans can control, is development (CNN).

According to CNN, this study has placed a value on “tree loss based on trees’ role in air pollution removal and energy conservation.” Or in simple terms, how much tree loss is costing us in US dollars. The amount added up to nearly $96 million just last year.