Golf Question of the Week:  How “Eco” Can We Go?

Brandon Tucker over at WorldGolf.com wonders if the whole craze over golf courses "going green" has the top golf spots facing a tipping point. His colleague at TravelGolf.com, Chris Baldwin, offers the cynic's view on the movement in seeking "golf's Al Gore."

I'm simply wondering when time and technology will catch up, and at least make it not-so-cost-prohibitive for golf courses to take the more environmentally friendly route.

Any time someone brings this topic up, I can't help but think of the Jack Nicklaus/Tom Doak collaboration up on the East End of Long Island, Sebonack Golf Club, that only opened a few years ago but has already become an environmentalist's delight with its many "eco-friendly" features:

• When being built, construction crews didn't use one bulldozer; very little earth was moved in an effort to preserve the natural terrain upon which Sebonack was built.
• Tree removal was done by hand, and the dirt was shaken off and left on the grounds.
• Owner Michael Pascucci and his group toured the country to interview experts on golf and the environment.
• Sebonack created its own compost site, and placed specialized liners under the greens so that runoff would go to a dedicated drainage area, from which the water could be used to irrigate the course.

Oh, and did I mention that when all was said and done, Pascucci soaked a tidy $125 million to build this place? For a $675,000 member initiation fee, I guess you can go as "green" as your heart desires.

So what does any of this have to do with the public golf arena - in particular, Myrtle Beach and the country's other golf vacation destinations? By the time Sebonack realizes its dream of someday soon hosting a PGA tournament, time, technology and publicity will have presumably closed the economic gap enough for the rest of the golf community to join the fray.

Far-fetched? Hey, it wasn't long ago that plasma screen TVs were a distant pipe dream for the average American. Who's to say the techies and scientists can't make this more attainable, sooner than later?

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