For everything there is a season, and for now, Green Needham’s Sustainable Landscaping Team has decided not to move forward with the Citizens’ Petition to ban gas-powered leaf blowers during the summer months. The Team believes that electric landscaping equipment should be — and will be — the future of yard care, but after more extensive outreach and communication with landscapers, it became clear that more time is needed to develop the necessary community and business support for a ban.
The case for phasing out gas-powered blowers remains compelling. Noise, unpleasant fumes, and polluting exhaust cause unhealthy conditions for people and for the environment. Time is on our side. As technology continues to improve, and more consumers demand quieter, non-polluting equipment, we will continue to push landscapers to transition to this quieter, cleaner technology.
The Team plans to continue their efforts to work for a transition to electric landscaping equipment:
- We will work to identify landscapers who are willing to give electric equipment a try this summer. Several landscapers have already agreed to participate. We plan to organize a field day for landscapers, where a supplier of electric equipment will introduce and demonstrate the various types of products and allow the landscapers to try them out.
- We plan to gather a list of landscapers who already use electric equipment or are trying it out, publicize the list, and encourage consumers to use these landscapers or ask their current landscapers to try electric equipment.
- We will work with landscapers to encourage interim solutions, including using gas leaf blowers on a lower setting and finding ways to use leaves as a resource — composting leaves for use as mulch rather than removing every leaf from the property.
- We will initiate a community education initiative, with themes such as:
- emphasizing environmentally friendlier alternatives to extreme leaf removal, including use of mulching mowers, raking by hand when possible, and using mulched leaves in flower beds or under shrubs to enrich the soil and help retain soil moisture.
- encouraging residents who use landscapers to ask their landscapers to use electric where possible, or to switch to landscapers who have committed to try it.
- encouraging residents who do their own yard care to purchase electric equipment.
- We will continue monitoring the experiences of other communities where various types of bans have already been enacted.
If you are interested in joining this effort, or would like to learn more about the Sustainable Landscaping Team, contact Team Leader David Rudolph or sign up on the Team’s webpage.
