Goodbye, noisy leaf blowers: Illinois landscaper offers all-electric ... - Yale Climate Connections
Goodbye, noisy leaf blowers: Illinois landscaper offers all-electric service " Yale Climate Connections
Fall brings the feel of cool weather, the taste of pumpkin, the sight of colorful leaves, and the sound of leaf blowers.
Hall: “In the COVID period, a lot of people were working from home, and the last thing that they needed was their noisy landscaper blowing leaves and very noisy leaf blowers while they’re sitting there on conference calls.”
Austin Hall owns Greenwise Organic Lawn Care in Evanston, Illinois.
To offer a quieter option, his company began testing electric landscaping equipment. It took some trial and error to find the right gear, but today, his team provides all-electric yard maintenance to about 250 of their clients.
They bring battery-powered mowers and leaf blowers and drive electric trucks, equipped with outlets.
Hall: “So we’ve been able to use the battery of the Ford Lightning to charge the batteries for the hand tools throughout the day.”
He says the electric service is a bit more expensive because the equipment costs more, and it takes longer because the gear is not quite as powerful.
But Hall says clients like that there’s less noise and carbon pollution. So he expects all his maintenance business to be fully electric within a few years.
Hall: “We think it’s the future of our industry, and we want to be on the cutting edge of that.”
Reporting Credit: ChavoBart Digital Media
Related Knowledge Center: ENERGY BASICS: electricity
Electricity is a secondary energy source: it is generated through the conversion of primary energy sources such as natural gas, coal, solar, hydropower, and wind. Electricity’s versatility is not cost-free: a substantial amount of energy is lost in its generation and the cost of storage is high, compared with fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas. The economics of battery technology hold the key to expanded use of renewable sources to generate electricity.