Plant the Lawns into Food and Biofuel

I have often wondered what would happen if we were to plant the miles of wasted space devoted to lawns to food and products that would actually help us. As it is, the american lawn continues to shoot us all in the foot as a costly and wasteful crop with aesthetic benefits and nothing else. The picture above is from NASA's Earth Observatory. I post their image as a way to attract attention to a group that does great work. Interestingly, "the scientists who produced the map estimate that more surface area is devoted to lawns than to any other single irrigated crop in the country" Lawns look nice, but in a world of scarce resources, can we afford them?

An article in the new issue of the business magazine Fast Company about China in Africa is very sobering in making clear that the age of scarce resources has only begun. The party is over for cheap gas, food, steel or whatever. If the Chinese are all going to live like Americans (I welcome them to the club), it is going to take a heck of alot of stuff. It is hard to blame a country that is only following our example in its development model. Besides, we are buying everything they produce. We are all connected.

What if everyone planted high yield food and biofuel crops on just a portion of their lawn? What a green revolution that would be. Maybe it wouldn't amount to much, but at least we would save bullets and our feet as well.