U.S. Marijuana Industry Responsible for $5 Billion in Energy Consumption

[onehandle]

Ariel Schwartz — It might be all-natural, but that joint you're smoking has a serious carbon footprint: marijuana growth uses 1% of all U.S. energy. Buzzkill, stoner pals. Your weed is really bad for the environment. Only the stuff that's grown inside, to be fair—the kind of boutique-y, mind-blowing pot preferred by many marijuana dispensaries. It's responsible for 1% of all electricity use in the U.S. That's a $5 billion yearly energy bill—two million U.S. homes' worth—just to get you super stoned.

The sobering news comes from a report by Evan Mills, a longtime energy analyst at Lawrence Berkeley National Labs who, uh, has a friend who told him about all this weed stuff. According to Mills, the problem can be traced back to the high-intensity lighting, dehumidification, air-conditioning, irrigation systems, space-heating, and ventilation systems that all go into making sure marijuana plants grow up to be healthy, smokeable adults. And since the industry operates in the shadows, it hasn't felt the consumer pressure to go green (rimshot!).

Mills's report gets even more intense when the energy consumption figures are broken down into consumer-friendly numbers. Smoking a single joint is the same as leaving a 100-watt light bulb on for 17 hours. For you more committed drug peddlers out there, each kilo is the same as five cross-country drives in a 44-mpg car.

So, smoking a joint of indoor-grown pot is like leaving the lights on for a day, and sitting around for hours with a handful of friends and a bong is as bad carbon emissions-wise as taking a really long road trip. Evan Mills has yet to calculate the added environmental costs of your vaporizer.

http://gizmodo.com/#!5791320/buzzkill-of-the-day-us-marijuana-industry-responsible-for-5-billion-in-energy-consumption

While watching 'Weeds' it occurred to me that indoor growers use a Lot of power-hungry equipment.

[sarcasmo]

1. Carbon tax on weed, some funny shit.

[walldude]

2. Oh I see. So we should grow all our weed outdoors

so we can get fucking busted by a nation that wants to complain about our energy use but makes it illegal to grow outside.

Yeah. Fuck. This. BULLSHIT.


I'm serious, anyone who buys this or believes this, should come out for legalization or crawl back under their rock.

Unrecced, crapped all over and spit upon.

[truedelphi]

6. I'm glad to know this type of slam is being used,

So I won't spit on the poster, but I stand in Solidarity with you about growing the weed.

There are only two reasons why it is outlawed - one) so the cartels can make their profit and keep on buying their "anti-drug" politicians

and two) so that the pharmaceuticals can patent the cannibinoids and make a huge profit selling what we could grow for free except for its illegality.

[HopeHoops]

3. It is also the largest cash crop in several states - INCLUDING New Hampshire (believe it or not).

[pscot]

4. Thatá more than offset

by the energy not expended by millions of tokers.

[KamaAina]

5. Correction: U.S. ILLICIT Marijuana Industry Responsible for $5 Billion in Energy Consumption

Legalize it, and the growing moves into the great outdoors, solar-powered. :smoke:

[Motown_Johnny]

7. someone needs to invent a more efficient grow light

I am not really buying the air conditioning and space heating thing, I assume these areas would be heated or cooled even if they were not being used to grow pot.

[Purveyor]

12. LED growlights are becoming quite popular... eom

[Blue_In_AK]

8. It really isn't necessary to use power-hungry equipment

to grow a personal stash. Shop lights work fine. You may not get those big joicy-looking buds, but even the little ones are smokeable and perform their intended function.

Or so I've been told.

[Mojeoux]

9. Duh! Legalize it and Weed Growers would be PROUD TO PAY any energy taxes,

Legalize and more outdoor growing.

Your post is hopelessly outdated, ill informed and an obvious hit piece on weed.

[obxhead]

18. They do pay energy taxes.

They must pay to keep the power on and that electric bill has a tax on it.

[Warren DeMontague]

10. Okay, another reason to legalize it.

Add it to the mountain of other reasons to FUCKING LEGALIZE IT ALREADY.

[fredamae]

20. Cannabis simply needs to be

Federally DE-Scheduled. Legalizing it still leaves some sort of regulation. Alcohol was "legalized" and look at the massive regulatory burden it carries.

So, simply De-Schedule it and be done with it.
Oregon has already Re scheduled it to a State sched II. The NCI has now agreed that Cannabis/Cannabinoids can shrink tumors and is beneficial for cancer treatment. That is in direct conflict with the DEA's Fed Sched I Definition.
It's going to be interesting to see how this plays out.

[Warren DeMontague]

24. I disagree. It should be legal, regulated, and taxed.

I don't think alcohol causes a "massive regulatory burden", tax revenues associated with it are substantial, and no one goes blind from bathtub gin anymore.

[Curmudgeoness]

11. But, but, but...aren't they using flourescent lights?

I thought that saved a lot of energy.

If those stupid rev'ners with ATF would leave us all alone, there would be a lot more outdoor growing going on.

[fredamae]

13. How many lights are left on all night in gov't offices?

[Scuba]

14. Aha! I wondered where they were growing it!!!

[hayu_lol]

15. Jeez...and to think that the Hollywood Hills used to be full...

of the stuff growing wild without care of any kind.

[obxhead]

16. We could cut .25% of Military consumption to cover it.

;)

[bemildred]

17. The Pentagon is the largest energy consumer there is. nt

[Warren DeMontague]

19. How much carbon emissions do those million-dollar-an-hour DEA helicopter flights generate?

How about those vans full of SWAT teams that go around kicking down the doors of pot co-ops, so they can haul brownie-eating cancer grannies off to prison? :shrug:

[hobbit709]

21. I know a couple who use solar panels on their growhouses.

it cut their electric bill 90%.

[robdogbucky]

22. To put that one isolated factoid into context

How much energy does the production of tobacco, or alcohol, or even automobiles consume?

And for whatever massive amounts of energy are used to produce those items, we get (figures are averages from 1999-2007):


Tobacco annual deaths = 435,000

Alcohol annual deaths = 85,000

Automobile annual deaths = 26,347

Marijuana annual deaths = 0


\http://drugwarfacts.org/cms/?q=node/30



Next

[fredamae]

23. In addition to that

There are more than 250,000 deaths each year attributed to adverse reactions to legally prescribed prescription drugs.
Many of these fatalities occur as medications are administered while in hospital.

We have well over 600,000 deaths annually from the adverse reactions of Legal Drugs and a total of about 10K annual fatalities from all illegal drug use combined.

We are getting zero ROI in sustaining current US Drug Policy.

[Mojeoux]

26. Yay, my favorite post of the day!!

I'd like to see these numbers in an OP. Thanks for debunking this dumb OP!

[Zorra]

25. So legalize it and let people grow it outside. Win-win-win scenario.nt