With all of the recent rain, the grass in Central Texas is growing rapidly and commercial landscapers and homeowners alike are powering up their mowers. If you watch either group at work you may see some using a very innovative technology. However, you’ll need to look very closely if you want to catch a glimpse of these autonomous robotic units at work.

Autonomous robotic electric mowers are small, efficient, and quiet, with only a small whirring sound to announce their presence. Once their cutting pattern is programmed, these machines will mow a lawn on a set schedule to the preferred cutting level smoothly and silently w

ith very little human supervision necessary.

While efficiency, convenience and a quiet work area are significant benefits, the emissions reduced by switching from gas to electric where able can be significant. The 2023 report “Lawn Care Goes Electric” shows how high emissions can be in the overall gas-powered lawn equipment category for the two pollutants monitored by CAPCOG: NOx and PM2.5.

• “Emissions of fine particulates (PM2.5) from lawn equipment in 2020 in the United States were greater than the fine particulate emissions produced by more than 234 million typical American cars over the course of a year.” (page 4)

• “In 2020, lawn and garden equipment emitted more than 68,000 tons of NOX emissions, the equivalent of pollution from 30 million typical cars as well as more than 350,000 tons of VOC emissions.” (page 5)

On ozone action days, local air quality is already compromised. Reducing the use of gasoline-powered lawn care equipment helps lower the chemical load of NOx and VOCs that contribute to dangerous ozone levels, directly protecting public health and improving local and regional air quality.

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Join our upcoming webinar and learn more about these and other innovative lawn care technologies from the experts at the Lawn Shoppe at Almighty Rentals, vendors, and product users. Webinar TBD in August. Enter your contact info here and we’ll send you the invitation.