Grass and the Environment
Heard of global warming? If you haven’t, it is more or less to do with the warming of the atmosphere that takes place as a result of what we do, what we build, eg indiscriminate use of cement in a local environment will not only create significantly higher temperatures locally but also contribute to the whole global warming problem.
Well, lawns have a cooling effect on your environment. Compared to bare ground, grass will reduce the surrounding surface temperature by 15*C and a neighbourhood of 8 average lawns has the cooling effect of 70 tonnes or air conditioning. (twice the cooling effect provided by the air conditioners of those same 8 homes!)
Lawn is also an efficient filter. Grass absorbs CO2, and other hydrocarbons and a range of other poisonous gases, converting them to oxygen. In fact 25 metres of lawn will produce sufficient oxygen to generate a quality of air suitable for a family of four!
It is also estimated that grass traps 12 million tons of dust annually (on a global scale), filtering the pollutants as the dust is washed back to the soil during periods of rainfall.
Perhaps the most significant benefit that lawn can make to the environment is its capacity to cleanse our water supply. Rainfall washes and carries pollutants from the atmosphere through the root systems of your lawn. A 100 square metres of lawn can develop a maze of 500 million klms of roots which trap pollutants before they reach and pollute our ground water supply. With the help of soil microbes, grass converts most of these pollutants into harmless organic compounds that build up our soils to support more life.
The environmental benefit of lawns over other surfaces of course, is obvious. Other materials like; cement, cobbled stones, wood chips and gravel, although they may be useful, do not possess the qualities that lawn does. So when you are considering how to cover an area of your property, don’t forget the value of lawn and the difference you can make to your own environment and that of your community, not to mention the global impact for good.
