Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!ames!hc!lanl!beta!dd
From: dd@beta.lanl.gov (Dan Davison)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Is Mowing your Lawn bad for the Environment?
Summary: arggh.  photosynthesis
Keywords: lawns, oxygen production
Message-ID: <24909@beta.lanl.gov>
Date: 25 May 89 03:51:05 GMT
References: <1989May23.190505.18229@utpsych.toronto.edu> <61605@yale-celray.yale.UUCP>
Distribution: na
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory
Lines: 30

In article <61605@yale-celray.yale.UUCP>, Ram-Ashwin@cs.yale.edu (Ashwin Ram) writes:
> In article <1989May23.190505.18229@utpsych.toronto.edu>, raymond@utpsych.toronto.edu (Raymond Shaw) writes:
> > Would the lawn produce more oxygen (which I presume is good for the environment)
> > if I didn't mow it, and just let it grow?
> Grass doesn't "produce" oxygen, it only gives off what it absorbed from the
> environment (in another form) to begin with.  

Right. CO2 -> O2+ carbohydrate 
> I imagine that if cut grass releases less oxygen into the atmosphere,
> it also absorbs less oxygen molecules  to begin with.

technically correct, actually wrong.  There is minimal loss of O2 out
of the atmosphere, so in that sense the total content of O is constant.

BUT, if the plants don't pull CO2 out of the atmosphere, it goes into
the geochemical carbon cycle as carbonate.  Less O2 is available in the
atmosphere in this case, so yes, cutting your lawn *does* make a
difference, a little teeny tiny difference.

See the articles on the geochemical carbon cycle and the differences 
between the earth and mars atmospheres in Scientific American.
(Last two years or so)


dan davison/theoretical biology/t-10 ms k710/los alamos national laboratory
los alamos, nm 875545/dd@lanl.gov (arpa)/dd@lanl.uucp(new)/..cmcl2!lanl!dd

-- 
dan davison/theoretical biology/t-10 ms k710/los alamos national laboratory
los alamos, nm 875545/dd@lanl.gov (arpa)/dd@lanl.uucp(new)/..cmcl2!lanl!dd