Dr. Michael Ellenbecker of Harmony is professor emeritus of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene on the College of Massachusetts Lowell and director emeritus of the Massachusetts Toxics Use Discount Institute.
Latest Monitor articles have described how some residents of Bow and Harmony are advocating for the set up of synthetic turf athletic enjoying fields of their communities. Proponents of bringing a turf discipline to Harmony claimed numerous advantages for synthetic fields when in comparison with pure turf, with out providing specifics past citing the drainage issues at Memorial Subject.
I’ll focus on particular disadvantages of synthetic turf fields, and advocate for a safer, more healthy, more cost effective different: natural pure grass.
Till lately, I used to be the director of the Massachusetts Toxics Use Discount Institute (TURI), whose mission is to help industries and communities to cut back their use of poisonous chemical compounds. TURI has studied the well being and issues of safety regarding synthetic turf intimately and has several reports available online. I’ll summarize that data right here, and references for all the information talked about beneath could be discovered on the TURI website online, turi.org.
All of us profit from working and enjoying in secure and wholesome environments, however we should have particular considerations for kids, who’re extra delicate to poisonous chemical compounds than adults. It’s thus extraordinarily necessary that we make cautious decisions about potential exposures of youngsters to poisonous chemical compounds.
Synthetic turf has been studied extensively and has been discovered to comprise poisonous chemical compounds. The first concern is with the infill supplies which are used to carry the bogus grass fibers upright and supply cushioning. The most typical, and most cost-effective, infill is crumb rubber, comprised of grinding up recycled tires. These black particles contaminate everybody’s clothes, hair and pores and skin after enjoying on a synthetic turf discipline.
The U.S. Environmental Safety Company has recognized greater than 350 chemical compounds reported within the literature as being detected in tire crumb. These embrace metals comparable to lead, cadmium and arsenic and a wide range of natural compounds together with benzene, styrene, polycyclic fragrant hydrocarbons (PAHs), phthalate esters, and biocides. PAHs are endocrine disruptors whereas arsenic, cadmium, benzene, and styrene are identified or suspected human carcinogens.
Different infills are available on the market however they’re all costlier and lots of of them have been much less studied than tire crumb and so their toxicity is unsure. There are additionally considerations for the bogus grass fibers. Latest testing has discovered some to comprise PFAS compounds. PFAS compounds are poisonous and are often called the “endlessly chemical compounds” as a result of they persist in nature for a whole bunch of years. PFAS contamination is of nice concern in New Hampshire.
Synthetic turf fields produce other disadvantages past their toxicity. They’ll change into a lot hotter than pure grass in sunny, heat climate, elevating the distinct risk of warmth stress and pores and skin burns. Temperatures on synthetic turf fields could be 30-60 levels hotter than on pure grass. Many cities with synthetic turf fields have needed to practice their coaches on learn how to acknowledge and deal with warmth stress of their baby athletes. This downside will solely worsen with international warming. Research have additionally discovered a rise in foot and ankle accidents on synthetic turf as in contrast with pure grass.
The choice to synthetic turf is, after all, pure grass, and the most suitable choice for cities, for my part, is pure grass grown utilizing natural turf administration, which eliminates using poisonous pesticides, herbicides and fungicides and ends in the most secure, healthiest enjoying discipline. Pure grass additionally captures carbon dioxide, decreasing a city’s carbon footprint.
Skilled athletes nearly universally want pure to synthetic turf. For instance, skilled soccer gamers all the time play on pure grass. If the U.S. girls’s soccer staff refuses to play on synthetic turf, so ought to Harmony Excessive Faculty’s!
City managers might say “that each one could also be true, however synthetic turf fields are inexpensive than natural grass fields.” Detailed price analyses have demonstrated that the alternative is true. Set up prices for synthetic turf fields are extraordinarily excessive, sometimes 5-10 occasions increased than pure grass (which ceaselessly solely requires an improve of an current discipline), whereas the annual upkeep prices of natural grass fields are solely modestly increased than for synthetic turf.
Research have proven that natural fields are cheaper to take care of than chemically-treated grass fields. As well as, synthetic turf have to be disposed of on the finish of its life, at nice monetary and environmental price. A examine of life-cycle prices discovered that the annualized price of a pure grass discipline was one-half of the annualized price of a “fundamental” artificial discipline and one-third the price of a “premium” artificial discipline. I’m fairly sure, for instance, that the drainage issues at Memorial Subject could be solved a lot much less expensively with an upgraded natural discipline than with synthetic turf.
In abstract, natural pure grass fields are cheaper, more healthy, safer, and extra pleasing to play on in comparison with synthetic turf fields. The selection is evident, go inexperienced and wholesome with natural, pure grass!
