New fake turf greening USA
More than half of the USA’s National Football League (NFL) teams have it, at least on their practice facilities, and thousands of high schools and colleges have also installed fake grass, according to The Economist (2/12/2006, p.7).
New fake grass revives industry: The leading synthetic supplier is FieldTurf, a Canadian firm that started out in the late 1980s selling tennis and golf surfaces, and then moved into soccer, football and lacrosse. Even FIFA, the international soccer federation, has approved it in recent years. But a new generation of fake grass has revived the industry.
Looks like real turf: Strands of artificial grass made from polyethylene fibres are sewn into a base and then surrounded and supported by a granular mixture that simulates soil. in the case of FieldTurf, this mixture contains sand, the ground-up soles of training shoes and rubber granules made from old tyres, which are cryogenically frozen, shattered and then ground up. All this is carefully laid down atop a bed of gravel, with drainage pipes to let water run off. It resembles grass, but with a plastic sheen and black sandy granules at its roots.
Easy and cheap to maintain: Lots of teams are installing it, largely because maintenance is so easy. In damp climates, real turf gets torn up by constant use. In dry ones, it demands constant watering. Synthetic turf suffers from neither problem, and also suits indoor stadiums. Rainfall helps keep it clean: water seeps through the rubber and drains into pipes just below the surface. FieldTurf also makes machines for annual deep-cleaning. The drawback is the cost. Fake grass costs nearly twice as much as sod to install, though it costs less to maintain.
