Fossil Fuel Free Land Care
By
Donna Davies
Posted: 2023-04-03T07:00:00Z
It's true!
Gas powered lawn maintenance machines like leaf blowers, lawn mowers, hedge or weed trimmers, chainsaws, and power washers are seriously harming the gardener who maintains your property and adding significantly to climate disruption. All of these small gas powered machines combined cause as much smog in California as light-duty passenger cars. According to the Air Resources Board, (CARB), “Operating a backpack leaf blower for an hour emits pollution comparable to driving a car from Los Angeles to Denver.”
During the pandemic when employees were primarily working from home, they noticed the painful and annoying loud noise from gas-powered machines, perhaps for the first time. No wonder that when CARB opened up feedback on banning the machines, thousands of Californians wanted to ban them as soon as possible and expressed their desire to be rid of the pollution and the noise. New electric replacements are much quieter and healthier for everyone.
Mountain View LWV member Bruce Karney has owned only one gasoline-powered piece of yard equipment, a cultivator (RotoTiller). “It was smelly, noisy, visibly polluting, and hard to start.” His new electric cultivator starts “with the push of a button and is quieter yet far more powerful.” He hopes other League members' families will go all-electric too.
CARB banned the sale of (not the use of) new gas-powered lawn maintenance machines beginning in 2024 and portable generators in 2028. To help homeowners make the transition, Silicon Valley Clean Energy is offering rebates on equipment. Some clients have joined together to purchase new equipment for their gardeners.
To help professional landscape businesses, AGZA offers training in low impact, low noise land care solutions while CARB offers vouchers.
"The new sales will start to make this transition to what's much cleaner as well as quieter equipment," said Bill Magavern of the Coalition for Clean Air. "That's going to be a major health improvement for the workers who use the equipment and for residents who are exposed, as well as everybody in the region because smog is really a regional problem."