Is Astro Turf Bad For The Environment

With significant water savings and low maintenance requirements, artificial turf is increasingly promoted as a replacement for natural grass on athletic fields and lawns. However, there remains the question of whether it is an environmentally friendly alternative to natural grass. The major concerns stem from the infill material that is typically derived from scrap tires. Tire rubber crumb contains a range of organic contaminants and heavy metals that can volatilize into the air and/or leach into the percolating rainwater, thereby posing a potential risk to the environment and human health. Health risk assessment studies suggested that users of artificial turf fields, even professional athletes, were not exposed to elevated risks. Preliminary life cycle assessment suggested that the environmental impacts of artificial turf fields were lower than equivalent grass fields.

Areas that need further research to better understand and mitigate the potential negative environmental impacts of artificial turf are identified. Recycling end-of-life tires reduces waste and provides a low-cost source of energy and materials such as crumb rubber, used as infill in artificial turf football pitches. However, some concerns were raised and remain about its safety. A dependence on indoor/outdoor conditions and the age of the source material was evaluated, often showing significative differences.

From this standpoint, this review is intended to add knowledge about the presence of contaminants in this recycled material, aiming to ensure the safety of end-users and the environment. The health and environmental consciousness of waste tires has increased tremendously over the years. This has motivated efforts to develop secondary applications that will utilize tire when they reach the end of their life cycle and limit their disposal in landfills. Among the applications of waste tires which are discussed in this review, the use of rubber crumbs in artificial turf fields has gained worldwide attention and is increasing annually. However, there are serious concerns regarding chemicals that are used in the manufacturing process of tires, which ultimately end up in rubber crumbs. Chemicals such as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and heavy metals which are found in rubber crumbs have been identified as harmful to human health and the environment.

This review paper is intended to highlight some of the methods which have been used to manage waste tire; it also looks at chemicals/materials used in tire compounding which are identified as possible carcinogenic. Crumb rubber granulate produced from end of life tires is commonly applied to synthetic turf pitches , playgrounds, safety surfaces and walkways. In addition to fillers, stabilizers, cross-linking agents and secondary components (e.g., pigments, oils, resins), ELTs contain a range of other organic compound and heavy metal additives. While previous environmental impact studies on CRG have focused on terrestrial soil and freshwater ecosystems, many sites applying CRG in Norway are coastal.

ICP-MS analysis revealed g kg–1 quantities of Zn and mg kg–1 quantities of Fe, Mn, Cu, Co, Cr, Pb, and Ni in the CRG. A cocktail of organic additives and metals readily leached from the CRG into seawater, with the most abundant leachate components being benzothiazole and Zn, Fe, Co , as well as detectable levels of PAHs and phenolic compounds. Concentrations of individual components varied with CRG source material and CRG to seawater ratio, but benzothiazole and Zn were typically the organic and metal components present at the highest concentrations in the leachates. While organic chemical concentrations in the leachates stabilized within days, metals continued to leach out over the 30-day period. Marine copepods exposed to high CRG leachate concentrations exhibited high mortalities within 48 h.

The smaller lipid-poor Acartia had a higher sensitivity to leachates than the larger lipid-rich Calanus, indicating species-specific differences in vulnerability to leachates. The effect on survival was alleviated at lower leachate concentrations, indicating a dose-response relationship. Benzothiazole and its derivatives appear to be of concern owing to their proven toxicity, while bisphenols are also known to be toxic and were enriched in the leachates relative to the other compounds in the CRG.

This review paper is intended to highlight some of the methods which have been used tomanage waste tire; it also looks at chemicals/materials used in tire compounding which are identified as possible carcinogenic. In a recent reivew of health and environmental impacts of synthetic turf, the authors point out that more data and research are needed to assess the risk presented by crumb rubber infill on the environment and human health. Nowadays concern exists about the safety for both football players and the environment of recycled tire rubber used as infill in synthetic turf football pitches. This is the first study of crumb rubber sport facilities in Portugal. Analyses were performed by ultrasound-assisted extraction followed by gas chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (UAE-GC-MS/MS). To evaluate the transfer of the target chemicals from the crumb rubber to the runoff water, water leachates collected from several football pitches were analyzed by solid-phase microextraction (SPME-GC-MS/MS).

In addition, lab-scale runoff simulation experiments were performed to assess whether a persistent inflow of the target compounds from the football pitches into the runoff water wcould exist. Results revealed the presence of most of the target PAHs in crumb rubber at total concentrations up to 57 μg g-1, next to a high number of plasticizers and vulcanization agents. Runoff water collected from the football pitches contained up to 13 PAHs as well as other chemicals of environmental concern.

In addition, continuous leaching of chemicals from the crumb rubber to the surrounding water was demonstrated. The transfer of target chemicals into the runoff water poses a potential risk for the aquatic environment. In addition, while public concern has focused on artificial turf use in playgrounds and athletic fields, the use of synthetic grass in homes, gardens, and daycare centers is widespread in Israel. Appropriate surface provision is fundamental to inspiring individuals to participate in outdoor sports and recreation activities. This study, therefore, aims to provide a knowledge base for this debate by exploring the benefits and disadvantages of synthetic turf compared with natural grass. Findings suggest that natural grass turf has multiple environmental benefits compared with synthetic turf sports surfaces.

Natural grass fields also have certain health benefits related to heat dissipation and psychological comfort, while synthetic turf offers health and social benefits in terms of the capacity to sustain heavy use and accessibility. This review suggests that choosing the right surface option for outdoor sports needs an adequate consideration of both short-and long-term environmental, health and wellbeing factors. Lawns are highly recognized and indispensable elements in the urban landscape. Due to water-saving, low maintenance cost, and avoided health-environmental impacts of agrochemical usage, artificial turf has increasingly replaced some natural turf sports fields and recreational lawns. It remains controversial whether AT is a healthy alternative to NT.

We asked the research question, "Where and for whom the AT is (or isn't) suitable regarding user thermal sensation partaking various activities? " We established a field experiment at adjoining AT and NT fields in humid-tropical Hong Kong. Detailed microclimatic data were recorded under sunny, cloudy and overcast weather conditions to calculate the modified physiological equivalent temperature as a thermal comfort index. Activities covering a range of metabolic rates were selected to evaluate user thermal sensation.

AT experienced considerably raised ground surface temperatures on sunny days with a consequential increase in near-ground ambient air temperatures and the environs. The inter-turf temperature difference was somewhat subdued under cloudy and overcast weather. A regression model allowed the successful development of a nine-point thermal suitability index to assess AT applications and provide a simple rule-of-thumb for design practice. To avoid undue heat stress, AT use can only be recommended for certain site-weather and user-activity scenarios. The TSI can be applied to other climatic zones by gleaning on-site microclimatic data and enlisting the proposed regression-modelling method.

A comprehensive AT assessment scheme can be developed by incorporating the TSI to inform future AT installation and use decisions. E-wastes are considered dangerous, as certain components of some electronic products contain materials that are harmful, depending on their condition and density. The harmful content of these materials pose a threat to human health and environment. Its toxic emissions mixed with virgin soil and air and causing harmful effects to the entire biota either directly or indirectly. Direct impacts include release of acids, toxic compounds including heavy metals, carcinogenic chemicals and indirect effects such as bio magnification of heavy metals.

Stereos, copiers, fax machines, electric lamps, cell phones, audio equipment and batteries if improperly disposed can leach lead and other substances into soil and groundwater. Due to savings in irrigation-water usage and maintenance cost, artificial turf has increasingly replaced natural turf in sports fields, and lawns in architectural, landscape, and urban design (Schneider et al., 2014). However, its adoption and conversion as a substitute for natural grass have remained controversial regarding impacts on the environment and human health (Cheng et al., 2014;Watterson, 2017). Some studies provided evidence of the litany of direct and indirect harmful effects of artificial turf.

The use of synthetic turf in sport fields, parks, yards, and playgrounds has gained popularity in recent years due to the low water and maintenance requirements. Most synthetic turf-like materials in sports fields share the same basic infill composition, which is made of recycled tire crumb rubber . A BASF study was conducted to compare synthetic and natural turf. Overall findings of the study determined that the synthetic turf systems measured significantly lower in terms of environmental impact.

This is especially true when you consider the amount of use afforded by artificial turf surfaces. By creating a dense plastic barrier on top of compacted soil and sand, no garden material can reach the soil beneath it. Things like leaf litter and grass clippings, which may be in tiny amounts in a normal garden after mowing and tidying but still exist. Natural materials like this are essential for feeding soil organisms like worms and microscopic animals that keep soil healthy. This is little different to impermeable hard landscaping like patios but a really important point if you're considering replacing a living lawn with a fake lawn. Even if you remove all clippings and leaves from a real lawn, real grass grows and dies back and rejuvenates every year.

Roots grow and die, some leaves die and these form natural material drawn into the soil to feed soil life. I could go into great detail about why soil life is important because it's the building blocks of our entire way of life; a simple example is birds picking out bugs and worms for food. Some astro turf will have worms beneath but this will be under a new laying or toward the edges where soil is richer from nearby planting. Over time, there will be nothing beneath fake grass for most soil life to survive. Astro turf is made from a variety of human made unnatural materials including polyethylene, polypropylene and nylon.

While individually these components can theoretically be recycled, in reality this isn't happening for fake lawns for the following reasons. First, the materials are often bound together making it impossible to separate them and therefore making it impossible to recycle, because recycling of the materials requires them to be separated and pure. Some products are made from just one material which means at least, theoretically they can be recycled. After spending 5 – 10 years outside on top of soil and surrounded by planting, with people running and walking across it, the amount of debris they collect makes the material very hard to prepare for recycling. You can't recycle plastics with contaminants in like soil and grit, which is why we're supposed to rinse plastic before putting in the recycling bin.

Thirdly, this is a specialist form of recycling, local councils certainly aren't set up to recycle rolls of fake grass, they need to be sent away. What will most people prefer, dumping it for free in the local tip or paying for it to be taken away and cleaned for recycling? Hopefully one day it can be recycled as we need the existing lawns to be recycled, but that doesn't account for the remaining 14 points. Artificial turf with black infill material gained widespread use on athletic fields starting in the early 2000s. One argument made in the desert southwestern United States for replacing natural grass-based athletic fields with artificial turf surfaces is that water is not needed for irrigation. However, it has been shown that in arid and semiarid climate zones the surface temperature of the artificial turf fields can exceed 80°C during the summer, requiring irrigation and drainage systems to keep them cool enough for use.

An experiment was conducted at New Mexico State University to evaluate the amount of water required to maintain surface temperatures comparable to those of natural turfgrass areas. A mathematical model was developed based on the heat balance equation to determine heat dissipation from artificial turf-based fields with comparison of the predicted values to experimental data. Overall, our model estimates were within 12% of the measured values. The model indicates that over a 24-h period, the amount of water (3.00 to 5.00 mm) required to maintain artificial turf at temperatures similar to irrigated natural turfgrass are comparable. Keeping your lawn looking green all year round requires a lot of work.

Depending on the soil in your area, you could need regular lawn feed in order to keep it looking its best. Similarly, weeds can spring up in every area of your garden and sometimes the only way to get rid of them is with weed killer. However, all that lawn feed and weed killer is not only harmful to the wildlife in your garden, but it can run straight into the water stream and affect drinking water. Fake grass installation can reduce dependence on harmful chemicals in gardening. By choosing the right artificial grass retailer, homeowners can select a durable Astroturf product that doesn't let weeds penetrate through the lawn. Looking great all year round, fake grass installation negates the need for chemicals altogether.

When people think of going green in their garden, it's unlikely that they will envisage Astroturf. But in reality, fake grass can be a lot friendlier to the environment than you might initially imagine. Purchasing synthetic grass from the right retailer could potentially help you to reduce your carbon footprint in the garden.

As a result, more and more people are considering swapping their lawn for artificial grass that often looks better and requires less maintenance than a regular lawn. There are also growing concerns about the impact of the synthetic chemicals that are added to artificial grass on human health and the environment. The EU has been investigating specialist artificial turf used on sports fields for suspected carcinogens, and is considering banning intentionally added microplastics. While these are different products to those sold to home gardeners, Berg says artificial pitches are sometimes reused for landscaping.

Tire shred processors use various mechanical means to reduce the waste stream of tires to components including rubber and steel. There is a stockpile of shredded rubber material in many states that is currently marketed mainly for use as Tire Derived Fuel . Civil engineering applications such as light landfill cover, and potentially landfill drainage layers are also attractive applications for shredded rubber material. Local environmental protection agencies and state public health officials have been reluctant, however, in some regions to allow recycled rubber to be used in civil engineering applications. An absence of data concerning long-term effects is often cited as justification for these bans. We summarized recent laboratory investigations conducted to quantify possible leachates from various recycled tire compounds.

Extension of these results to reported field tests detailing the impact of recycled rubber on air, soil and water quality is also considered, as well as biological and toxicity issues. Finally, we identify areas where additional research is required and suggest approaches supporting "Better Use Determinations" for use of recycled tire rubber in these applications. To our knowledge, no studies have been conducted about its effect on biodiversity, despite the potential ecological consequences that artificial turf has for urban wildlife . Rubber tires contain several compounds that are known or suspected carcinogens.

Many carcinogens are mutagens, and fluctuation assays based on the Ames test can be used as an initial screen for mutagenic potential. Granulated crumb rubber from recycled tires is commonly used in the creation of artificial athletic fields, and the surface temperature of these fields can reach levels far above the ambient temperature. In this study, crumb rubber samples taken directly from four separate artificial athletic field surfaces were used to make leachates using water at different temperatures. For each of these fields, leachates obtained in water at 70 ºC showed significant mutagenic potential (p ≤ .001) in Salmonella typhimurium fluctuation assays. Leachates obtained in water at 40 ºC showed no mutagenic potential for any of the fields tested. For one field, crumb rubber heated in water at temperatures as low as 50 ºC resulted in significant mutagenic potential (p ≤ 0.001).

Water used in an experiment designed to mimic the irrigation of an artificial athletic field also showed mutagenic potential (p ≤ 0.001) in a fluctuation assay. Increased temperatures subject athletes to several heatrelated illnesses and can potentially reduce field use times when surface temperatures exceed certain thresholds . The crumb rubber infill of artificial turf contains organic contaminants and heavy metals that can runoff and/or leach into water sources or volatize into the air . Furthermore, disposal of many artificial turf field components cannot be recycled or degraded . ELTs were ground into granulates of different size and called 'crumb rubber'.

Currently, the durability and the maintenance needs of such surfaces is under scrutiny as there may be differences between the commercial assessments and the empirical findings about the pitch and playground lifetimes. There is a distinct lack of research into quantifying the effects caused by artificial lawns on hydrological processes, such as stormwater runoff, retention and drainage. There have been many articles written about the negative impact rubber crumb can have on people's health due to the rubber crumb containing arsonic and other harmful chemicals. None of the artificial lawns that we install use rubber crumb infill. As population increases, so should overall youth sports participation, and subsequently the total number of community sports fields.

Synthetic turf fields have several advantages over natural grass fields. In addition, synthetic turf fields can be used more frequently because they do not become muddy after precipitation and do not require waiting periods between uses to facilitate repair and recovery . The headspace solid-phase micro-extraction GC-MS analysis evidenced that at 70 °C natural rubber and thermoplastic elastomer release amounts of organic species much higher than recycled scrap tires.

In particular, the desorption of mineral oils, with a prevalence of toxicologically relevant low-viscosity alkanes in the range C17–C22, and plasticizers was clearly evidenced. The new-generation thermoplastic elastomer material also releases butylated hydroxytoluene. In slightly acidic conditions, quite high amounts of bio-accessible Zn, Cu, and Co are released from recycled scrap tires, while natural rubber releases mainly Se and Tl.