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California moves toward ban on gas lawnmowers and leaf blowers

latimes.com

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Re: California moves toward ban on gas lawnmowers and leaf blowers

#61

Post by ansible »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #29
tomp wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Electric yard equipment is now good enough that gas alternatives aren't necessary in most cases. Have you used any? The batteries last 100x less than the tiny amount of petrol you pour into. You have to recharge 3x just to mow the whole (moderately sized) lawn. Hopefully newer models are better, but given the slow progress of car batteries, I doubt they're much better.

The argument is we shouldn’t be dumping air quality externalities on everyone to have attractive landscaping. Everyone is collectively used to burning fossil fuels without paying the true cost, and wrings their hands when they have to pay for their use case with zero emissions technology. The value of clean air is proven from scientific research on emissions. https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/air-polluti…

We (our entire society) should really be reconsidering lawns and "attractive lawns" in general. The care and maintenance of Kentucky bluegrass is a tremendous drain on resources, a significant cause of pollution (air and water), and destroys the habitats of native plants, insects and animals. It is just bad all around.

Re: California moves toward ban on gas lawnmowers and leaf blowers

#62

Post by mdp2021 »

AlbertCory wrote: post #36
chenster wrote: post #11

Totally second this but on a different ground. It's simply the noise it makes. Many people have been left trapped at home, working remotely as a result of Covid. A noisy machine, such as a gas-powered leaf blower, can disrupt a peaceful neighborhood day. Imagine your neighbor to your left mowing the lawn at 8 a.m., then neighbor to your right at 9 a.m., then another cross the street started at 10 a.m., and on and on.…

Addendum: also need to ban children playing outside. They make so much damned noise.

So, quantitative definition: noise from X, benefit, social context (responsibility) and avoidability of X, for each X - children, blowers, dogs, stereos... I do not see the discrimination too difficult. What can be avoided, what should be avoided, what should be replaced, what should be regulated...

Re: California moves toward ban on gas lawnmowers and leaf blowers

#63

Post by Ekaros »

mmcgaha wrote: post #44
TanakaTarou wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can still use a leaf blower but in the future it must be electric powered instead of gasoline.

I can see it now. Some dude sitting around drinking coffee waiting for his gear to charge plugged into a gas powered generator.

I hope they get to charge by hour, not by job.

Re: California moves toward ban on gas lawnmowers and leaf blowers

#64

Post by bob1029 »

jet_32951 wrote: post #37
ericbarrett wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every city I lived in in California (NorCal and SoCal) already banned use of gasoline-powered gardening equipment. But none of them ever enforced it.

Berkeley was getting pretty aggressive with their ICE leaf blower enforcement last time I visited, which led me to wonder what happens when gardeners start buying ICE generators and plugging AC electric equipment into those. AFAICT these laws don't affect that.

> ICE generators

These can be made to be far quieter than the engine strapped to a human's back. A truck-bound genset can weigh 2000lbs+ no problem, which means it can house the same engine you would see in a honda civic, along with all of the same emissions and noise control devices.

Many new work trucks (F150 electric-only, for instance) output 240v, which would be more than enough to run a wide range of yard equipment (at the same time).

Alternatively, I'll agree that my yard guys can plug into my outside power outlets when they are doing the yard. I'll even let them plug in for my neighbor's yard too, if its more convenient for them. This level of intermittent use is negligible on someone's bill.

Re: California moves toward ban on gas lawnmowers and leaf blowers

#65

Post by otterley »

mmcgaha wrote: post #44
TanakaTarou wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can still use a leaf blower but in the future it must be electric powered instead of gasoline.

I can see it now. Some dude sitting around drinking coffee waiting for his gear to charge plugged into a gas powered generator.

Modern battery technology is way better than it used to be. Today, you can use the same battery you use to power your cordless drill to power radios, vacuum cleaners, circular saws/table saws, chainsaws, trimmers, and even lawnmowers. DeWalt's 20V MAX system in particular is pretty neat.

Re: California moves toward ban on gas lawnmowers and leaf blowers

#67

Post by asdff »

Mountain_Skies wrote: post #58
TanakaTarou wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can still use a leaf blower but in the future it must be electric powered instead of gasoline.

Currently they bring their own fuel to worksites. What happens when there's no outlet for them to plug into? There are large numbers of landscaping scenarios where this will be the case. Do they bring a diesel generator? All of my yard tools, including my lawnmower, are electric. For reasons of both cost and power, I went with corded rather than battery powered. Battery tech is constantly improving and maybe at some…

It seems like commercial should be granted an exemption here. It's just not realistic to run battery operated hand tools like it is if you are only maintaining one single family home sized lot for all the reasons you mentioned. Plus gardeners can repair and maintain their own gas powered tools themselves, can't do that with electronic equipment that is built to be disposed of rather than fixed.

Re: California moves toward ban on gas lawnmowers and leaf blowers

#68

Post by sklargh »

These engines are not great and I don’t mind the ban in my town. That said it was temporarily an excuse for people to be incredibly rude to folks who keep our homes maintained. I paid a my landscaper’s fine while they figured out the ordinance.

Reading a little further this is a comprehensive ban on an engine class…I wonder if the CA legislature understands that small engine chainsaws are an essential tool in wildland firefighting?

Re: California moves toward ban on gas lawnmowers and leaf blowers

#69

Post by spikej »

dghughes wrote: post #21

I had an electric lawn mower it was great compared to gas mainly due to it being so quiet. Charging wasn't too bad at first one battery for the front yard and one for the back. But then one battery would not charge as much or run for as long as when new. The store had moved on to new models so I couldnt buy a battery in store. Even if I could it was expensive $100, the mower cost $250. Online even the manufacturer se…

That's one of the reasons I went with corded... It's a little annoying, but a fraction of the cost, never runs out of juice, I never forget to charge it, and only thing I've had to do in years is replace the blade.

In most of these types of articles, no one mentions the problems that batteries are going to cause... (environment and convenience)

Re: California moves toward ban on gas lawnmowers and leaf blowers

#70

Post by garciasn »

lostapathy wrote: post #59
garciasn wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently bought a new house where I had to care for the yard (previously owned in a HoA which handled yard care) and tried an electric leaf blower. It made it no more than 10 mins on a charge and the batteries took 8-10 hours to get back to 100%. I didn’t find that at all adequate to the task.

Professional lawn crews will use professional tools. I don't know what you bought, the Ego equipment is actually pretty good and has fast-ish chargers available.

It’s why I hired a company to do the work and returned the battery operated leaf blower.

It’s worth every penny to have someone else do the work.

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