Using weed recreationally might change the climate inside your head. But cannabis production is generating large amounts of gases that heat up Earth’s physical climate.
Indoor cannabis farming is booming in the United States thanks to the legalization of the drug in Colorado and elsewhere. Jason Quinn and his colleagues at Colorado State University in Fort Collins looked at how much electricity and natural gas are needed in various states to grow marijuana in an artificial indoor climate, which allows for a consistent product in any weather. The researchers then calculated the greenhouse-gas emissions associated with this energy consumption.
The team found that the energy required to yield one kilogram of dried cannabis flower produces the equivalent of 2–5 tonnes of carbon dioxide. Moving weed production from indoor facilities to greenhouses and the great outdoors would help to shrink the carbon footprint of the nation’s legal cannabis industry, the researchers say.
Native136 on March 10th, 2021 at 12:48 UTC »
I don't know the laws in the US but here in Canada starting an outdoor cannabis grow op is ridiculous. It is far easier to do so indoors.
A few regulations that contribute to this:
The site must be completely secure. Meaning that no one can have access to the plants except by forced entry. You must have a surveillance system that watches all plants. Only Health-Canada authorized personnel are allowed on the site Your trimming, harvesting and packaging stations have to be in seperate rooms or completely sanitized between tasks.I looked into starting a grow op a while back and it is nearly impossible for a small entrepreneur to start an operation let alone an outdoor one. It is far more manageable to start an indoor one in a warehouse type building.
MrEmouse on March 10th, 2021 at 11:58 UTC »
I think one of the big reasons indoor cultivation is popular is because of security. It's a lot easier to keep out thieves if your weed farm just looks like a building. If you had fields or greenhouses, you'd likely need to have a high security fence around the whole thing, which would make it pretty obvious your farm is not growing carrots and potatoes.
If it was a normal farm it wouldn't be a huge deal if you lost a couple plants to thieves... But a weed farm would likely lose their license to operate if it was determined their security has any deficiencies. So losing a couple plants could mean losing the whole farm.
tuctrohs on March 10th, 2021 at 11:31 UTC »
In case anyone is fooled by the headline's implication that it's some weird gas emitted by the plants, they are just talking about energy used for indoor growing (electricity consumption and natural gas), and in some operations, added CO2 for plant growth.
From the abstract: