An artificial turf field on a summer day is hotter than grass and asphalt. Here’s what to know about the debate over grass vs. turf.

Column by Michael J. Coren

Yale epidemiologist Vasilis Vasiliou won’t let any of his five children play on artificial turf fields.

His research on the infill for synthetic turf — typically ground-up tires — identified the presence of dozens of known carcinogens, hormone disrupters, toxic metals and phthalates. What’s really needed, he said, are rigorous studies showing the extent to which those chemicals find their way into young players’ bodies and what that might mean for their health over time.

Until then, Vasiliou said, “I would not recommend parents let their children play on there. Period.”

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By Guy Oldenkotte
Jan 7, 2025

Synthetic turf recycling pioneer Re-Match has announced that it will discontinue its operations at the Herning factory in Denmark.

The Danish subsidiary has filed for restructuring with the relevant authorities.
According to a statement, “the industry and tender system still does not fully or sufficiently incentivize municipalities and turf providers to recognize the value of circularity and to use the most effective circular solution to handle their used synthetic turf.”

This decision to discontinue operations at the Herning facility follows an evaluation of the Company’s financial position, operational challenges, and the broader economic and industrial environment.

“I highly regret the closure of our exceptional Danish operations and the difficult parting of ways with many of the highly capable, mission driven colleagues at our Herning site – we were all working towards a shared goal. We will continue to make every effort to achieve this goal, accelerating the sustainability transition of this industry” says Coen Rooijmans, CEO of Re-Match.
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Read the announcement 

View the full investigative report from NBC.

By David Abel Boston Globe Staff, Updated July 18, 2024

PORTSMOUTH — Two years ago, as local officials debated whether to replace the city’s high school athletic fields with new artificial turf, Superintendent Zach McLaughlin promised the school board that tens of thousands of square feet of the old turf would be recycled.

Local environmental advocates urged the city to plant grass instead, noting that artificial turf is not only filled with toxic chemicals and requires large amounts of fossil fuels to manufacture, but that it’s difficult to recycle. They also noted that there’s little evidence that such large fields are ever fully recycled, despite industry claims.

The school district decided to proceed with installing new turf and paid a Massachusetts company more than a half million dollars to oversee the work, including recycling.

Nearly a year after the Canton-based Atlantic Sports Group removed the old turf, environmental advocates did something that appears to be unprecedented and confirmed long-held fears about the industry’s turf-recycling claims: They managed to track down the old turf and discovered that it had been abandoned in an otherwise empty, dimly lit warehouse in New Jersey. They also found it listed for sale on Facebook Marketplace.

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Danish company Re-Match secured state incentives to open a recycling plant in 2022. It hasn't happened yet. Meanwhile, thousands of rolls of the fake grass, containing PFAS, are piled up on farms.

by Barbara Laker and David Gambacorta
Published Dec. 13, 2023, 6:00 a.m. ET

​Money doesn’t come easily to farmland owners in the tranquil, rolling hills of Pennsylvania. So at first, Jim Halkias thought he’d hit the jackpot.

A real estate broker had approached him in late 2018, and explained that a Denmark-based recycling company called Re-Match wanted to pay $4,500 a month to store more than 1,000 rolls of used, deteriorating artificial turf on 45 acres that Halkias owns in Grantville, Dauphin County.

Halkias was told that Re-Match intended to one day recycle the old turf. The company didn’t yet have a recycling facility in the United States, but the offer was enticing.
“It seemed,” he said, “like a great deal.”

The deal soon soured.

Halkias claims that Re-Match stopped paying him after two years, but left hulking rows of turf, stacked 10 feet high, at the edge of a cornfield, near a farmhouse and visible from the road. Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) received a complaint about the unsightly stacks, and inspected Halkias’ land.

The agency categorized the old turf as “solid waste” that constituted a “public nuisance,” and further determined that Re-Match had violated state environmental laws by failing to obtain necessary permits for storing the turf.

For years, Halkias has tried to sell his farm. He says three potential buyers lost interest because of the rolls of turf. “No one will accept the property,” he said, “with all this stuff, which is considered to be waste by the DEP.”

There is no government agency that monitors or regulates the disposal of artificial turf, which contains toxic chemicals, including PFAS, or per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances, also known as forever chemicals because they don’t break down in the environment and stay in the human body for years.

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Turf recycler hit with environmental violations as it works to open PA plant
by Bethany Rodgers
Bucks County Courier Times

In 2021, then-Gov. Tom Wolf announced that a Danish artificial turf recycler would be opening its first U.S. processing center in Pennsylvania, providing a new destination for ever-accumulating piles of discarded sports fields. 

The company, Re-Match, would receive Pennsylvania loans and grants totaling $1.85 million to open its recycling facility, which is expected to create around 40 new jobs in the commonwealth, officials said. 

More than a year later, the processing center hasn’t opened. In fact, an official in Rush Township, Schuylkill County, where the future plant is expected to operate, said the company hasn’t yet gotten the municipal approvals needed for the project.

Meanwhile, the artificial turf they one day hope to recycle has been waiting around, stacked in sagging piles in Pennsylvania fields and parking lots. And the very same company that is in line to capture nearly $2 million in state incentives is also getting notices that it’s violating the commonwealth’s environmental laws. 

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