Remodeling or adding to a house can be both exciting and stressful. It’s thrilling to watch your dreams and plans for perfecting or growing your home become a reality. At the same time, the process itself can be chaotic, hectic, and disruptive.
Believe it or not, construction projects can be just as stressful for a lawn as they are for a homeowner. While remodeling can beautify and enhance the value of a house, it can also do severe damage to the landscaping around it and the environment as a whole.
It is essential to approach any construction project with an awareness of the environmental risks and ways to avoid or diminish them.
Threats to Your Lawn
In general, lawns are good for the environment. They filter rainwater, produce oxygen from carbon dioxide, prevent runoff, and absorb an impressive amount of airborne pollutants.
But there are plenty of threats to your healthy, planet-friendly yard filled with berries. These threats often increase during construction projects.
Runoff is a significant issue to keep an eye out for during any remodeling or construction project. Runoff is water that drains away from another location. This water can contain quite a few pollutants, including:
- Pet waste
- Human waste from inefficient septic systems
- Household chemicals
- Pesticides
- Fertilizers
- Sediment
In addition, the construction process itself can introduce harmful pollutants into your lawn. It is critical to guard against this pollution.
Discuss Your Concerns with Your Contractor
The first step to avoiding potential environmental damage during construction is to express your apprehensions with the contractor in charge of the project.
Go over your contractor’s plans to reduce or avoid damage to your yard and the environment with them. Ensure your contractor is familiar with all EPA, state, and local environmental standards and has a detailed plan to ensure compliance.
Ask your contractor to use environmentally-friendly equipment when possible. Ask them to identify ways they can reduce the project’s carbon footprint.
Require Protection for Your Lawn
The effect of the heavy equipment and vehicles necessary for many construction projects can be devastating to a healthy lawn. One way to mitigate this damage is to use access mats to protect your lawn.
Access mats keep large vehicles and equipment from rutting surfaces and destroying vegetation. The original construction mats weighed at least 1,000 pounds, but now there are composite mats that weigh less than 100 pounds and can be used by any type of contractor.
Never Leave Glass on the Lawn
One thing that you will want to avoid at all costs is leaving any kind of glass on your lawn during the construction process. Glass can kill grass and other vegetation by magnifying rays of sunlight. This damage can occur as quickly as fifteen minutes.
Conclusion
Your lawn is your pride and joy and is not easy to maintain like your foundtaion plants. While remodeling and other construction projects can pose environmental threats to your yard and the surrounding areas, you can avoid the worst of these threats with a little planning and consultation with your contractor.
