From Landscape Management magazine.
In a new supplement to the industry magazine Landscape Management, Lauren Dowdle has an article called "BATTERY BOON: How battery-powered equipment is helping operators save energy, win bids and go green."
It includes stories of landscaping companies that have switched away from hyper-polluting gas-powered leaf blowers and other equipment to battery-powered alternatives. Sample:
With 90 percent of his equipment being electric, Ron Rose—owner of EQ Grounds in Auburn Hills, Mich.—says it has helped set the company apart....
He decided to rely heavily on electric mainly because of the gas and maintenance savings.
“After you pay off the equipment, there are pretty significant savings, considering you have to pay about $30 a day for one gas mower. You can run for less than $5 a day with an electric mower,” Rose says.
Electric equipment also has helped differentiate the company from its competition.
“It gives you a little bit of an advantage,” he says. “People are receptive to eco-friendly and low noise.”
All along, the argument for Council member Mary Cheh's bill in Washington D.C., and its counterparts around the country, is that they are "accelerating the inevitable," in forcing a change away from an outdated, inefficient, and hyper-polluting technology, to a fast-developing clean alternative. This feature in a major industry publication is another sign that the industry itself is ready for the change.