Imagine taking a walk down the lovely tree-lined streets of our treasured town. Perhaps you are walking with a friend, relative, taking a child to school, walking a pet, or just enjoying some down time of your own. You hear them long before you see them – the gas-powered leaf blowers (GPLBs). In some instances, the equipment is being used on multiple properties on both sides of the street, making it difficult to avoid the noise, dust, and fumes.
Is it only a disruption of peace and quiet? Not at all. There is a growing body of evidence showing the negative impact of GPLBs to the user’s health, the community’s health and the health of our ecosystem.
The introduction of readily available, effective, and affordable electric leaf blowers has made GPLBs an obsolete and unnecessary health hazard. (1)
Research on air quality has found:
- In 2011, engineers at the company Edmunds, an online resource for automotive information, estimated that driving a Ford F-150 Raptor truck from Texas to Alaska would emit the same amount of air pollution as a half-hour of yard work with a two-stroke, gas-powered leaf blower. (2)
- The force of wind GPLB creates can spread materials on the ground like mold, leaf litter, dirt, yard chemicals, and animal waste up into the air where particles can trigger additional health issues like asthma attacks, worsening allergies or COPD symptoms . (3)
- The pollution can linger for hours or days, depending on the weather. (4)
- Nearly all leaf blowers and line trimmers use two stroke gasoline engines. The problem with two stroke gasoline engines is their high level of both hydrocarbons, HC, and Volatile Organic Compounds, VOCs.(5)
- Up to 30% of the fuel mixture is incompletely burned and exhausted into the atmosphere. The incomplete combustion also creates high hydrocarbon emissions such as CO and CO2, both implicated in global warming. (6)
- Particulates in the smoke as well as aerosolized VOCs are known carcinogens and protagonists of lung disease especially in children.(7)
- Pollution from fine particulates causes millions of premature deaths each year around the world and health problems ranging from cancer to reproductive ailments to mental health problems. (1)
- In 2020, lawn and garden equipment in the U.S. emitted more than 21,800 tons of fine particulates – an equivalent amount to the pollution from 234 million typical cars.(1)
GPLB’s may present additional health risks to their users:
- The World Health Organization has a daytime noise guideline of 55 decibels (dB). A worker operating a GPLB is exposed to exponentially higher noise - >90-100 dB.
- Excessive vibrations cause back and neck injuries (8)
Due to the particular pitch and low frequency of GPLBs, the sound penetrates walls and windows and carries over long distances – dangerous to hearing even at 800 feet! One leafblower at one residence can impact 8-14 neighboring properties .(9) The risks from the sounds GPLBs emit can include:
- Increased stress hormones (3)
- Sleep disruption (7)
- Hearing loss (7)
- Lower test scores for school children – over 20 studies have shown that noise adversely affects children’s academic performance. (9)
- Children are especially vulnerable to life-long hearing loss and tinnitus from this noise.(10)
- Unprotected exposure to noise louder than 65 decibels (65 dB) has been found to raise blood pressure and adrenaline levels, and damage hearing. (10)
- The U.S. EPA says noise degrades quality of life by impairing communication and social interaction; reducing the accuracy of work, particularly complex tasks; and creating stressful levels of frustration and aggravation that last even when the noise has ceased (11).
So, what can we do?
- Leave the leaves! In places like walkways and sidewalks where leaves may present a hazard, rake leaves into your flower beds, use around the base of trees (being careful not to pile against the tree trunk) or a designated compost area in your yard to use later. Leaves provide important nutrients for your soil. The leaves also provide welcome habitats for important pollinators like butterflies, moths, and fireflies. (12)
- If you own a gas-powered leaf blower , consider switching to a plug in or battery-powered electric model. They are cleaner, quieter, and emit less pollutants. (7)
- Before you choose a landscaping company, ask which type of leaf blowers they use. Let them know that you are looking for a company that uses plug-in or battery-powered blowers.
Sources:
1. Lawn Care Goes Electric - https://publicinterestnetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Lawn_Care_Goes_Electric_Oct23.pdf
2. Leaf Blower's Emissions Dirtier than High-Performance Pick-Up Truck's, Says Edmunds' InsideLine.com - https://www.edmunds.com/about/press/leaf-blowers-emissions-dirtier-than-high-performance-pick-up-trucks-says-edmunds-insidelinecom.html
3. Leaf Blowers Leave Lungs Vulnerable (Respiratory Health Association) - https://resphealth.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Gas-Powered-Leaf-Blowers-Leave-Lungs-Vulnerable.pdf
4. The Unintended Consequences of Leaf Blowers – www.barrington.ri.gov/DocumentCenter/View/1228/The-unintended-consequences-of-leaf-blowers?bidId=
5. Air Pollution: Asia’s Two-Stroke Engine Dilemma - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1247506/
6. It’s Time to Ditch Gas-Powered Leaf Blowers - https://www.momscleanairforce.org/ditch-gas-powered-leaf-blowers/
7. Volatile Organic Compounds in the Home - https://www.lung.org/blog/volatile-organic-compounds-at-home
8. Occupational Hazards Landscape Professionals Need to Watch For - https://ohsonline.com/Articles/2022/06/09/Occupational-Hazards-Landscape.aspx?admgarea=news&jw_start=%7bseek_to_second_number%7d&Page=3
9. Does noise affect learning? A short review on noise effects on cognitive performance in children - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3757288/
10. Gasoline Engine Leaf Blower Health Hazards, Environmental Harm, Legislation and Alternatives For the White House Environmental Justice Advisory Council - https://www.quietcleanpdx.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Blumenstiel_Report_for_WHEJAC_Dec2021.pdf?__im-TLTmrFce=14334164786675675074
11. Excerpt from Noise: A Health Problem, United States Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Noise Abatement and Control, August 1978. This can be obtained from the web site of the Noise Pollution Clearinghouse at www.nonoise.org.
12. This Fall, Leave the Leaves! - https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2022/10/17/fall-leave-leaves
Additional Resources:
Citizens for a Quieter Sacramento - https://www.nonoise.org/quietnet/cqs/leafblow.htm
Kleinman Center for Energy Policy at the University of Pennsylvania - https://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/news-insights/think-globally-on-climate-act-locally-on-leaf-blowers/
Quiet Clean Philly - https://www.quietcleanphilly.org/
