Budgets: California bans sale of gas mowers

Now that the ban of gas mowers has passed in California, has anyone thought of landscape budgets? Obviously the battery powered equipment is much, much more and those costs are going to be passed along from the landscaper to the HOA to the homeowner.

The new law will ban the sale of all off-road gasoline engines, including generators, lawn equipment, pressure washers, chainsaws, trimmers and even golf carts. Under the new law, these machines must be zero-emission, which means they’ll need to be battery-powered or pluggable

The law prevents the sale of new mowers, not the use of existing ones. As long as the existing gas mower is properly maintained, they should last a very long time.

No need to worry yet.

One reason battery operated mowers are more expensive is lack of demand. California just upped the demand which means more companies will make more of them, increasing the supply. The prices of battery operated mowers will come down somewhat and, since equipment is only one part of a landscaping business's overhead, it will not increase their costs by that much. I doubt any HOA will have a noticeable increase in their budget.

The ban won't take effect until 2024 at the earliest. Maintained commercial landscaping equipment lasts 5-10 years, so this really won't be an issue until 2029 or so. In addition, California will be offering rebates to help offset costs and provide further incentive to upgrade.

I agree. However, having researched riding battery powered mowers for the last year, I haven't found one that doesn't have issues unrelated to double the cost of gas mowers.
Hopefully, this action will get those that manufacture the mowers a reason to address those issues.

I will say that I have had great success with battery powered push mowers.