Thanks to “Climate Desk” for pointing out this gem of an article.
These factoids are from the earth-friendly “Mother Jones” magazine “24 Mind-Blowing Facts About Marijuana Production in America”, referencing several federal data sources.
A few of those points:
- 80 percent of all marijuana grown in the USA comes from California, Tennessee Kentucky, Hawaii, and Washington. The vast majority comes from California.
- In 2013, California authorities seized 329 outdoor pot grow sites with: 1.2 million plants, 119,000lbs of trash, 17,000lbs of fertilizer, 40gal. of pesticides, 244 propane tanks, 61 car batteries, 89 illegal dams, and 81 miles of irrigation pipe.
- During California’s growing season, outdoor grows consumed roughly 60 million gallons of water a day – 50% more than is used by all residents of San Francisco.
- In California, indoor pot growing accounts for about 9% of household electricity use.
- For every pound of pot grown indoors, 4600lbs of carbon dioxide goes into the atmosphere. California’s production equates to emissions of 3 million cars.
- The energy needed to produce a single joint is enough to produce 18 pints of beer, and creates emissions comparable to burning a 100 watt light bulb for 25 hours.
Source: http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2014/03/marijuana-pot-weed-statistics-climate-change
References: Jon Gettman (2006), US Forest Service (California outdoor grow stats include small portions of Oregon and Nevada), Office of National Drug Control Policy, SF Public Utilities Commission, Evan Mills (2012).
I’m sure eco-activists will jump right on this trash-making climate-killing water-sucking pot problem we have here in California and include it right up there with the urgency of the proposed statewide plastic bag ban and banning fracking by chartering buses:
Mitchell explained that as San Diegans living at the end of the water pipeline, it is even more critical that we participate in this rally to convince Governor Brown that water is a precious natural resource more necessary than fracked oil and gas. “This awful drought effects us all and we need to stop wasting that water on fracking,” she said.
Yeah, but dude, pot is a life necessity.
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Smoking pot is actually good for your CO2 foot print. Say, if you are stoned all weekend, you can’t drive!! ff, on the other hand, you go on a roadtrip for the weekend, you can burn 2000 litres of fuel! It is high time (sic!) that more states legalise, or else we can’t meet the 2C target anymore 😉
Rabelad says:
March 17, 2014 at 12:52 pm
The article’s claim that one pound of pot burned produces 4,600 lbs of CO2 into the atmosphere is patently, wildly and laughably absurd.
_________________
In addition to all power usages mentioned, many indoor growers release CO2 into the grow rooms to maximize leaf mass/lumen. Powered ventilation is necessary to remove humidity and to replenish CO2 levels. Growers in cold climates have been discovered and busted by ice formation around the exhaust vents.
You think the numbers are absurd? If your calculator works, you can prove it.
Okay, okay, I get the “trimming” of my comment. You are good to do so as well.
Will you now change the first bullet point to reflect at least what the original article actually states?
Resourceguy says:
March 17, 2014 at 12:44 pm
Who says plants can’t think. They found a way to cultivate humans in order to benefit and expand themselves via chemical manipulation, even indoors in protected environments at great expense.
============================================================================
ROTFLMAO
Super come back with detailed information. NOT. The load is leveled over the various activities.
You argue with the man, and I repeat the link since you didn’t bother looking at the top of the post:
http://evan-mills.com/energy-associates/Indoor_files/Indoor-cannabis-energy-use.pdf
His estimate was 200 watts/sqft, but some of the things people are proposing to do are pushing it up another 50 watts. There is undoubtedly room for improvement, but today is what today is. See the full discussion (with occasional humorous comments) here:
http://forums.mikeholt.com/showthread.php?t=159842&highlight=marijuana
You can’t comment without signing up, and it’s restricted to those in the electrical profession, but anyone can look.
Mojo says:
March 17, 2014 at 1:04 pm
Do you really think I’m that stupid?
Sheesh.
_______________
We weren’t going to say anything to you.
Really.
Once the enviromentalists rid the planet of all power sources that emit carbon, how long will it take them to rid the planet of the infestation of carbon-based life forms?
MattS – I am glad you asked. Everybody says that plants can’t think. Nobody says that they do. Pleasure to help 😉
…this is the first step to getting pot heads to pay carbon credits
Khwarizmi on March 17, 2014 at 1:41 pm
An alkaloid that’s good for the brain??? The reward system of the brain is designed for carb’s, not alkaloids, alcohol(s) or any other syntetic drug! It’s a “design” flaw and not difficult to figure out! Well, if not the brain already is damaged enough by the substance though … In admitting an addiction, the first stage is any kind of denial …
Patent on natural stuff and derivates? Mother Nature is the rightworthy owner of those kinds of patents … A serious patent office will not pass anything that in some way or close to exist in nature or is limited in design (like software “patents”)), but a greedy/corrupt one will … Patents may be good, but can also completly limit a free market and slow down or even stop the process of inventions. That’s not progress …
DirkH on March 17, 2014 at 1:47 pm
“…Nobody ever smoked himself to a Nobel price…”
Why do I start thinking about a specific mann …?
@SasjaL says:
March 17, 2014 at 3:07 pm
Patents are of two general types; process or composition. Utilization of plant derivatives might fall under either one. A process patent might cover how the useful compound is extracted and purified. A composition patent might cover the useful delivery mechanism including powder, liquid, aeresol or ointment and inlude diluents and co-agents. A serious patent office ought to consider all these items. None of these would touch on the formula for the base compound.
You can probably harvest your own willow bark, but I like to reach for my bottle of Bayer.
So…if we removed pot from California maybe sanity would return to climate science?
LadyLifeGrows says:
March 17, 2014 at 1:20 pm
Marijuana is a green plant and like all other green plants, it is a net carbon sink in itself.
If the wild claims in this article are true–or even 1% true–then this nonproblem comes from the electricity for all those indoor grows–which are needed only because pot is illegal. Legalize possession and growing of pot, and the grow operations can move out doors.
——————————————-
Good points.
With legalization we could reduce the international trafficking foot print as well .. why support drug lord mafia type government or extreme moslem terrorists high on heroin with a take over agenda of many young and old Americans already hooked on heroin. And using American dollars, wreaking havoc in the lives of countless others, to fund their schemes.
I think Colorado’s 32%? state tax is a bit much. That only keeps the illegal pot cheaper. They had their millions estimated and spent before passing legislation.
To Country Joe Mc Donald off Paris Sessions Lp..
Colorado Town
…just trying to make it back home with a lid or two..
hey where are you going, what are you doing, have you got some identification?
http://youtu.be/VjrDVDfNFmw?t=22m57s
I have to say, this article triggers my bullshit detectors big time. The numbers suggest that growing 1 pound of pot requires 1150 pounds of coal to be burned. My brother in law (legally) grows medical marijuana indoors in Michigan. Lights and heat and water for the plants — even in cold Michigan — cost at most a small fraction of the total energy cost of his household.
Wikipedia tells us this useful fact:
“Coal-fired electric power generation emits around 2,000 pounds of carbon dioxide for every megawatt-hour generated…”
The article thus suggests that growing one pound of pot costs well over two megawatt-hours of energy. To put this in perspective, that is the equivalent of running a kilowatt’s worth of grow lights for 2000 hours — a reasonable growing season — per pound. I rather suspect that is off (too high) by around an order of magnitude.
To put it into dollar perspective, at 10 cents a kilowatt-hour (roughly half of California rates IIRC) 2 MW-hours = 2000 KW-hours = $200 (or more reasonably, $400 in CA) worth of electricity per pound grown.
So I suspect that this is either propaganda or the product of somebody’s arithmetic-free imagination.
Of course, it would be a lot more cost effective to grow pot in a greenhouse or open field — hemp basically is a weed crossbred by humans, after all — if it weren’t for the fact that it still is insanely expensive and sufficient motive to attract thieves willing to use deadly force to obtain it. At least indoors you have a chance of keeping the world from knowing that you are growing it.
In ten more years, pot will very likely be legal in almost all of the states, either flat out legal or legal for “medical” use within some restrictions. In twenty, it will be legal everywhere, and historians will be writing about the absurdity and human cost of the 90 prohibition and persecution of pot (compared to other human vices legal and illegal it is positively benign, with the greatest single risk factor from using it being the fact that you could be arrested, which is very bad for your health, your freedom, and your life, far worse than any effect of the drug itself (and the second greatest risk factor is the risk of violence in the organized criminal distribution system that provides it). If/when growing it is legal almost everywhere, so that the black market disappears, perhaps people will grow it outdoors in sufficient quantity that it is no more worth stealing than somebody’s tomatoes.
Think of all of the carbon dioxide we’ll save! In fact, at that point, pot will be a valuable CO_2 sink. At least transiently.
rgb
Far out man! Uh…wait. What?
D.J. Hawkins on March 17, 2014 at 3:20 pm
Sorry for not being clear enough, my bad!
I was basically refering to the so called “patent” on cannabinoids. A process that the marujana plant already have been
D.J. Hawkins on March 17, 2014 at 3:20 pm
[obummer …]
… marijuana plant already have been using long before the patent was granted …
@rgbatduke says:
March 17, 2014 at 3:34 pm
The report is only 13 pages long, and lists all the assumptions and calculations. I didn’t see anything that looked bat-shit crazy. Maybe one of our BS detectors needs re-calibration. For the one thing you specifically mentioned, the 1kW grow light, that’s what is in the standard 4-plant grow module. Run time is 12 hours per day for 60 days during the 78 day cycle. Production per cycle is about 1.5 pounds dry weight. And all that is just the grow light. As Willis says, show the man where he’s wrong.
hunter says: the headline does not read smoothly. should it be …..”grown”……
Yes, I had to read it about 5 times too, before I could work out that “grows” is apparently a noun and not a verb.
“a grow” is a new one on me.
“Marijuana grows in California …” sure does. Rest of the phrase makes not sense.
@Greg and Hunter “a grow” is common police speak here for an illegal pot farm. But I can see how you’d be all flummoxed by that. So I’ll change it for you out-of-staters that find it problematic.
Did you read the actual patent, and not the fluff on some legalization site?
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=6630507.PN.&OS=PN/6630507&RS=PN/6630507
To call it tough sledding is an understatement, but they are clearly talking mostly about compounds other than TCH. Just because it says “cannabinoid” doesn’t mean it comes from Cannabis Sativa. Many of the compounds are synthesized. The patent appears to be a composition patent, given all the group substitutions they are talking about. Without some expensive equipment and very high level lab skills, you couldn’t take your homegrown MJ and produce the theraputic compounds as described in the patent, and thus achieve the theraputic results described therein. Smoking a joint will NOT keep a stroke from turning you into a vegetable.
DirkH says:
March 17, 2014 at 1:47
…Nobody ever smoked himself to a Nobel price…
Yes he did, and blew enough smoke to make the White House.
Think of all of the carbon dioxide we’ll save! In fact, at that point, pot will be a valuable CO_2 sink. At least transiently.
rgb
Wow, “carbon-free” marijuana. What a selling point.
What they don’t seem to have accounted for is all the helicopter flight hours that the DEA , FBI LAPD are obliged to put in burning carbon dirty fossil fuels. Then there’s the cost of building and heating prisons, and the energy and materials wasted repairing all the kicked in doors.
The carbon footprint may be larger than they thought. It’s outrageous, it should be banned!
Oh wait, it is. That didn’t work. Perhaps we need to try something else.
rgbatduke says:
March 17, 2014 at 3:34 pm
——–
and others.
This is from Mother Jones! Has anyone EVER read a truthful article in MJ? The ragazine is for sheeple.