The Environmental Benefits of Artificial Turf

There are many environmental benefits of artificial turf. We all know that it reduces the cost of home landscape maintenance, but did you know that it also benefits our environment? Let’s examine a few of the reasons:

Conserving water

Even though the drought has been drastically reduced, we should still keep conservation in our minds. Based on recent EPA water usage statistics, most American families use around 320 gallons of water per day. Approximately 30 percent of that amount is allocated for outdoor use. Most of this is used to water lawns and other gardening applications. At a national level, irrigation for residential landscapes is almost one-third of total water use, which totals almost 9 billion gallons per day.

Switching to synthetic grass almost entirely eliminates your home irrigation bill. You may have to sometimes use your hose to clean pet waste from the turf, but that’s about it.

Decreasing CO2 emissions

Some people genuinely like the act of mowing the lawn. It’s excellent for your physical health, but there are some problems with it. One is that it takes a long time, and the other is that the gas emissions from a lawnmower can contribute to global CO2 levels. As of March 2022, there are 418 ppm (parts per million) of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. This is approximately 0.04 percent of our atmosphere, which is not ideal for the residents of our planet.

With the ever-fluctuating cost of gasoline and other fossil fuels, investing in artificial turf makes the most financial sense. While mowing your lawn may just seem routine, the carbon dioxide emissions can cause more pollution than you might imagine. With artificial turf, these problems simply vanish. Because artificial turf requires no mowing whatsoever, you are helping reduce pollution. The only real maintenance on artificial turf is occasionally having to brush away debris. Think of all the time you’ll save!

Less chemical runoff and contamination

Around 60 percent of fertilizer and other lawn chemicals are wasted and ultimately contribute to chemical runoff. As many of us know, chemical runoff can have devastating environmental consequences. Many of these chemicals are highly toxic to animals and insects and have the potential to decimate local ecosystems. They are also very dangerous to humans, particularly when consuming contaminated water.  Health problems such as birth defects and allergies are just a few of the effects of contaminated water exposure. With artificial turf, using maintenance chemicals like pesticides is absolutely unnecessary. In fact, in 2012, artificial turf installations prevented the use of 1 billion gallons of pesticides and fertilizers!

There are many more environmental benefits of artificial turf. At FieldTurf Landscape, we have been helping our customers switch from natural grass to artificial turf for years. Call us today!