Karl Furlong
Feb 20, 2022
“Fuck man, this is war,” said Michael Hall.
Hall just witnessed his neighbor blow a dead rat over on to his property with a gas-powered leaf blower. A swift kick sent the rat back where it came from, but the leaf blower proved to be a more challenging irritant.
The contraption’s high-pitched whine travels through glass, wood and concrete. It leaves few places to escape if a neighbor is blowing leaves.
Hall went to his neighbors and asked about their use of leaf blowers. What was wrong with just leaving the leaves on the lawn? Why did the blowing need to happen so frequently? Aren’t there quieter options? After much protestation only one neighbor got rid of their leaf blower. Hall realized there was a problem, and he decided to do something about it.
In 2017 Hall co-founded Quiet Clean PDX (QCPDX). The group’s mission is to convince the government to ban gas-powered leaf blowers. QCPDX is one of hundreds of similar groups across the country that have had enough.
The most frequent complaint is noise. But the oil and gas spilled into the soil and the pollutants pumped into the air are what organizations like QCPDX are now focused on.
“The environment is number one, and second is the exhaust and third is noise,” said Hall. “California has more pollution from landscaping equipment than vehicles right now.”
A 2011 study commissioned by Edmunds found that one industrial strength leaf blower running for a half-hour emitted the same hydrocarbons as a Ford F-150 driven from Texas to Alaska. In the past 10 years the F-150 has gotten cleaner, but the two-stroke leaf blower hasn’t changed.
Hall is an unlikely environmental warrior. After 35 years teaching at Pacific Northwest College of Art, Hall was just easing himself into retirement when he was audibly assaulted by his neighbor’s leaf blower. The additional time Hall was now spending at home exposed him to the many landscaping companies using gas-powered leaf blowers in his neighborhood.
Hall was a lonely voice at first, “I felt like Don Quixote, tilting at windmills, because I was the only one out there.”
But soon people started to come on board and QCPDX grew. Now Hall has a group of seven that work with him and over 1,500 subscribers to the group’s newsletter.
Hall’s store of patience is seemingly bottomless. But navigating the labyrinth of federal, state, county, and local government agencies, along with politicians, lobbying groups and neighborhood associations, year-after-year has had an impact. He’s tired and ready to share more responsibility with the next generation of activists.
“I'm more tired now, but I'm not Don Quixote anymore,” said Hall. “There's a national movement now that I can help push forward.”
Hall believes that left alone the renewable energy market will take care of gas-powered leaf blowers in 10 years. What Hall is trying to do is speed up their demise.
“The fossil fuel market has thrown up their hands,” said Hall, “it's inevitable, it's coming,”