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FAIRWAYS4FUTURE: Managing high quality golf course fairways and semi roughs without herbicides and less emission of greenhouse gases.

Summary

Replacement of fairway and semi-rough mowers that burn fossil fuel with lightweight electricrotary mowers is an important step to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from golf courses. Besides eliminating fossil energy, N2O emissions may also be reduced by this change, due to less soil compaction. However, recent research shows that robotic mowing may lead to more white clover, and therefore reduced playing quality, on semi-roughs.

In the 2023 season, experiments using the new generation of GPS-controlled robotic mowers will be performed at our research facility in Norway and on golf courses in Scandinavia and Germany.

Contact
Karin Juul Hesselsøe

Karin Juul Hesselsøe, NIBIO Landvik, N-4886 Grimstad,  Norway. Tel: + 47 413 96 851 E-mail: karin.hesselsoe@nibio.no

FACTS
Category: Water, nutrients, construction
Status: Ongoing
Project period: 2023-2025

Fundings (kSEK)

 

2023

2024

2025

 

 

Total

STERF

      413

329

343

 

 

1085

Other sources

2044

374

388

 

 

2805

Total

2457

703

731

 

 

3890

 

Project objectives

  • To investigate management strategies for fairways and semi-roughs (robotic vs. manual mowing, mowing height and fertiliser level) that result in high turfgrass and playing quality with the lowest possible inputs of energy and fertiliser.

  • To determine the long-term effect of robotic mowing on soil physical conditions affecting greenhouse gas emissions from golf course fairways and semi-roughs.

  • To investigate how the combination of mowing system (robotic vs. manual), mowing height and fertiliser rate affects the infestation rate of individual weed species and other aspects of turfgrass quality on fairways and semi-roughs.