The environment of Florida in the United States yields an array of land and marine life in a mild subtropical climate. This environment has drawn millions of people to settle in the once rural state over the last hundred years. Florida's population increases by about 1,000 residents each day. Land development and water use have transformed the state, primarily through drainage and infill of the wetlands that once covered most of the peninsula.
Much of Florida consists of karst limestone veined with water-filled caves and sinkholes, which provide homes to many species of aquatic life, some unique to particular Florida locations. As urban and suburban development have increased over the last decades, demand for groundwater has also risen, resulting in damage and drying out of portions of the cave system. This has led to ground subsidence as dry caves collapse, threatening property as well as ecosystems.
Restoration of the Everglades has long been recognized as an environmental priority in the state. In 2000, Congress passed the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan, a $7.8 billion, 30-year project aimed at preservation and restoration of the region and its unique combination of environments.
By 2018, 30% of the land area of the state was in conservation.
History
Population growth and development
The 1900 United States Census identified only four cities in the state of Florida with more than 5,000 inhabitants: Jacksonville, Pensacola, Key West, and Tampa. The total population of the state was recorded as 528,542. The southern third of the state was sparsely populated, and much of it was partially submerged marshlands. A few attempts at diverting the flow of water from Lake Okeechobee to the land to the south had occurred as early as the 1880s, but it was not until the election of Governor Napoleon B. Broward in 1904 that any significant drainage occurred. Broward had campaigned on a platform that included draining the Everglades and selling off the resulting land. Beginning in 1906, and continuing until 1913, over of canals were dug, creating the Miami Canal, the North New River Canal, and the South New River Canal. An even more ambitious and expansive program followed, resulting in the construction of six large drainage canals and numerous smaller canals, totaling ; of levees; and 16 locks and dams over a 14-year period, from 1913-1927. As land was reclaimed from the Everglades, farmers moved in. Vast farming areas sprang up in southeastern Florida and the northern Everglades. Development was further spurred by the Florida land boom of the 1920s, during which a speculative wave resulted in a frenzy of planning, land redevelopment, and construction continued until 1926, when the bubble burst. Between 1926 and the beginning of World War II, growth in the state was slow and relatively stable.
As World War II came to an end, thousands of people moved to Florida, bringing about a sharp population increase. The state's population in 1940 was 1,897,414; in 1950, it was 2,771,305, an increase of 46.1 percent. The Tampa Bay area and South Florida were the biggest-growth areas, although almost all of the coastal areas along the peninsula saw strong growth.
By 1945, a prolonged drought in Florida spotlighted the first signs of the consequences of altering the environment. Saltwater intrusion became an issue in wells in the southern part of the state, and large wildfires consumed parcels of farmland, destroying the peat which had made the land so fertile. Prior to instituting controlled burns, the state forests and pastures burned for months during the dry season. From the 1940s to the 1970s, the state and federal government assumed control of burning that prevented uncontrolled fires. In 2010, the state burned a record .
Extensive flooding in 1947, during which 90 percent of the state south of Orlando was underwater, made it clear that the current drainage projects were not beneficial to the environment, to farmers, or to the developing cities. 1947 was also the year that Everglades National Park was dedicated, and the year in which Marjory Stoneman Douglas published The Everglades: River of Grass, which warned of the damage that had occurred to the fragile ecosystem. The following year, the state of Florida created the agency which eventually became the South Florida Water Management District, responsible for water quality, flood control, water supply and environmental restoration in 16 counties, from Orlando to the Florida Keys.