Scientists say that if we planted one trillion trees, we could naturally solve our climate crisis. The issue is… that’s a lot of trees! Trees don’t grow in any type of soil. Trees are prone to insect infestations. Don’t get me wrong – I’m a tree hugger. I love trees. But there’s a plant better designed to draw down CO2 from our atmosphere.
Hemp grows very quickly and can be planted close together. Trees take significantly longer to grow and require much more space than hemp. A plot of land growing hemp therefore absorbs more carbon dioxide than almost any plant. Scientists estimate that for every ton of hemp grown, 1.63 tons of carbon dioxide is removed from the atmosphere. Plus, hemp crops can be grown in nearly any type of soil. They require very little water and don’t need any fertilizers or insecticides to stay healthy. And hemp begins sequestering carbon the moment it is seeded.
Growing more hemp crops would make a substantial positive impact on global warming. The rise in average temperatures on earth is caused by higher concentrations of greenhouse gases; specifically, an increase in carbon dioxide emissions. Carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere and prevents it from being released into space. Warming temperatures cause negative effects including freak weather conditions, droughts and a rise in sea levels due to the melting of glaciers.
Hemp cultivation also encourages biodiversity in the soil, by regenerating farmland that has long been depleted from the use of toxic chemicals. Hemp is a “weed” and grows like one, ubiquitously, beating out other plants without pesticides; and its long tap root holds the soil, channeling moisture deeper into it. Unlike trees, hemp can be grown on existing agricultural land and included in a farm’s crop rotation. It improves the quality of the soil with positive effects on the yields and the profits from other rotated crops.
Industrial hemp permanently bonds carbon within the fiber which then can be used for anything from textiles, to paper, to building materials. It is currently replacing plastics in car production at BMW.
Hemp grows to 13 feet in 100 days, making it one of the fastest CO2-to-biomass conversion tools available. It can be grown on a wide scale on nutrient poor soils with very small amounts of water and no fertilizers. Hemp is a very leafy, dense plant. As such, hemp releases more oxygen into the atmosphere than most other plants.
Hemp can also sequester carbon back into the soil through a process called, biosequestration. When the hemp crop is harvested, it can be slow-smoldered, not burned, to create biochar. This charcoal-like product is then tilled into the soil adding nutrients and sequestering carbon. According to a paper provided by Holon Ecosystem Consultants, hemp can produce as much as 13 tons of biochar per hectare annually, which triples the output of Salix (a popular biomass crop) plantations.
Other advantages of hemp:
Hemp can be grown in a wide range of latitudes and altitudes.
Hemp can produce three crops per year.
Hemp replenishes soil with nutrients and nitrogen, making it an excellent rotational crop.
Hemp controls erosion of the topsoil.
Hemp makes paper more efficiently and ecologically than wood, requiring no chemical glues.
Hemp converts CO2 to oxygen better than trees.
Hemp produces more oil than any other crop, which can be used for food, fuel, lubricants, soaps, etc.
Hemp can produce bio-fuel and ethanol (better than corn).
Hemp fibers can make very strong ropes and textiles emitting less CO2 in production than cotton or nylon.
We need to promote hemp cultivation as an effective and integral part of a holistic approach to solving our climate crisis.
The Earth’s resources must be used at a rate at which they can be replenished. However, there is now clear scientific evidence that humanity is living in an unsustainable fashion, and that an unprecedented collective effort is needed to return human use of natural resources to within sustainable limits. Therefor the Environmental Importance for HEMP and Climate Change is crucial!
In 1989, the World Commission on Environment and Development articulated what has now become a widely accepted definition of sustainability: “to meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” –Wikipedia
Crucial facts for CLIMATE CHANGE
HEMP IS THE ANSWER! Crucial facts for CLIMATE CHANGE
Hemp converts the sun’s energy via photosynthesis into multi-beneficial cellulose faster than any other plant. Hemp is at least four times richer in cellulose potential than the already legal sources, such as cornstalk and sugarcane, traditionally used for biomass production. Further, hemp is so low-moisture and woody that little to no energy is required to dry the crop prior to biomass conversion, which is not the case for other sources like sugarcane and maize.
According to the IPCC, while fossil-fuel combustion is the primary cause of greenhouse-gas emissions generated by humans (57 percent), deforestation comes in second, contributing almost one-fifth of climate-altering emissions in the form of increased CO2.
According to the Environmental Defense Fund, 32 million acres of tropical rainforest have been cut down every year since 2000. The EDF notes that any realistic plan to reduce global warming has to preserve these rainforests, which absorb CO2 in the air and replace it with oxygen — just as cannabis does. If these rainforests are the lungs of the planet, then hemp can be seen as Earth’s oxygen tank.
Hemp is a suitable replacement for the wood derived from these forests because its fiber is more durable and can be recycled more frequently than wood fiber. Also, the plant’s roots penetrate a foot into the soil during the first six weeks of growth — and can ultimately extend down to eight feet — allowing the plant to withstand flooding. Hemp can also survive intermittent frosts reaching as low as 12°F. Hemp doesn’t require fertilizer or herbicides, and it enriches rather than depletes the soil via aeration through its deep roots.
The hardy and versatile hemp plant would naturally assimilate in forests and tree plantations, although this process would result in initial start-up costs for making the transition. But like every other front in the fight against global warming, it comes down to prioritizing the long-term sustainability of the planet over a shortsighted bottom line.
The various processes for converting hemp biomass into fuel are too numerous to be discussed in this article, but the most promising appears to be hydrolysis, because it can potentially yield 100 gallons per ton by converting cellulose into fermentable glucose. This means a single acre of hemp can theoretically produce ten tons — or 1,000 gallons of fuel — per growing season.
Hale the PLANTS!
The US Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency are all on record declaring the production of biodiesel and bioethanol as essential for addressing the environmental crisis caused by fossil fuels.
This is especially true since, one way or another, the days of fossil fuels are numbered. There will come a point in time when all fossil fuels have been depleted, despite being technically “renewable” because plant and animal materials create such fuels. Since the process takes millions of years, we are depleting known fossil-fuel reserves at a much faster rate than new ones are able to form, which means that workable alternative sources of energy must eventually be harnessed if we are to maintain our present car culture.
It replaces trees as the source of raw material for wood and paper, thereby conserving forests. Trees take years to grow, while a crop of hemp can be grown in a few months. One acre of hemp produces as much paper annually as 4 acres of trees.
When burning hemp as a fuel, carbon dioxide is released into the air, but this is absorbed by the next crop, which can be harvested 120 days after planting. This quick growth avoids the build-up of carbon dioxide. Also, hemp is a very leafy plant and thus contributes a high level of oxygen to the atmosphere during its growth; between 20 and 40%. This makes up for the loss of oxygen when it is burnt as a fuel, which in turn, reduces unwanted effects of global warming, acid rain and the depletion in the ozone layer on the environment.
Air pollution is reduced since hemp is naturally resistant to pests and does not need pesticides and herbicides to be sprayed. Very little fertilizers are required, since it’s abundant leaves fall into the soil and release the required nutrients and minerals, thereby creating better soil tilth. Cotton and flax are known to consume 50% of all pesticides; hemp replaces cotton as a raw material in the manufacturing of paper and cloth, and flax fiber or seed for animal feed, animal bedding and paper.
Soil enrichment: The hemp crop grows dense and vigorously. Sunlight cannot penetrate the plants to reach the ground, and this means the crop is normally free of weeds. Its deep roots use groundwater and reduce its salinity. Also, erosion of topsoil is limited, thereby reducing water pollution. The roots give nitrogen and other nutrients to the soil. After the harvest, this soil makes excellent compost amendments for other plants, and hemp cultivation can follow the rotation of agriculture with wheat or soybean. In fact, the same soil can be used to grow hemp for many years, without losing its high quality. The hemp plant absorbs toxic metals emitted by nuclear plants into the soil, such as copper, cadmium, lead and mercury.
Fabrics made of hemp do not have any chemical residue, and is therefore safe for consumers. Even if the fabric contains only 50% hemp, it can keep the UV rays of the sun from harming the skin underneath.
Hemp products can be recycled, reused and are 100% biodegradable. The growth speed of the plant is fast enough to meet the increasing industrial and commercial demand for these products. Switching to hemp products will help save the environment, leaving a cleaner and greener planet for the next generation.
The current state of Hemp does not seem to be focused on fiber. why?
Colorado is more closely associated with cannabis production, but it is also the leading producer of hemp. On the state level, hemp was legalized in Colorado back in 2012, so producers have had a huge headstart on the competition.
Kentucky has retaken its place as a major producer of hemp since the crop was legalized by state legislators in 2013. Before the change in federal law, there were over 200 licensed hemp growers in the state as well as 43 processors.
Oregon, North Dakota, Minnesota and New York are other major producers of hemp. These states benefited from their legislators legalizing hemp years before the federal law changed.
Other agricultural states are almost certain to embrace hemp as a crop now that the crop is legal on the federal level.
For the first time in our life, we as a country and a society can have hope for a sustainable thriving future. We now have the ability to utilize our natural resources of HEMP, especially hemp for fiber. Side note here, Hemp fiber is used for industry so the level of THC is non-existent, it’s a non-issue. No one’s going to smoke a shoe, a house, even a piece of paper or hemp plastic. This is a big benefit to this industry, the regulation change, there’s no ingestion of the plant on any level. So again the question is why not grow hemp fiber?
In 2018, I plunged down the rabbit hole of Industrial Hemp and have since worked in the Southern Oregon region promoting education, networking and business development for the Hemp & Cannabis Community.
As this crop’s journey from contraband to commodity unfolds, we’ve been given even more reasons to be enthusiastic about its future. CBD sales are surging worldwide amid the COVID-19 pandemic as people grasp for better ways to manage stress. Oregon data showed average dispensary purchases increased by 40% in the thick of the lockdown here, with close to $100 million in sales for the month of April.
That means tax dollars pouring into state coffers during a time when other business sectors are suffering amid closures and slow re-openings. We are living through a time when pivoting is necessary to survival and growth, and if we can accelerate our best practice development as an industry, COVID-19 may just be the window of opportunity we needed.
Since the beginning of my work in hemp education, I’ve seen that it does take a village to come together and carry forward the promise of this powerful plant. During the time I produced the Hemp University series at Southern Oregon University, I had the honor of curating our region’s best minds and talents to share their expertise with the wider national and international hemp community.
When COVID hit, I pivoted just like everyone else and shifted my activities online with the production of the Hemp Symposium Due Diligence Series. Starting in May, we featured Farmer Tom Lauerman of Farmer Tom Organics and Damian Moran of the Amota Group/Hemp Exchange giving a pre-planting overview to participants from all over the world.
In partnership with UPLVL and Hempington Post, we’ll be offering another edition on Friday, July 10, from 1-3 PM. Focusing on “Mid-Season Strategies”-Integrated Pest and Nutrient Management and Pollen/Sexing, the free webinar will present the wisdom of two Oregonian hemp veterans, Emily Gogol of Infinite Tree and Eviane Ita-Coton of Ebb and Flow Farms.
Participants will have the opportunity to take a brief assessment over the symposium topics on the UPLVL Cannabis Learning Platform and earn a micro-certificate in Mid-Season Due Diligence.
So, comejoin the village on july 10 as we continue to work together and position this crop for the destiny we all know it has – as a sustainable commodity with the power to bring us the food, fuel, fiber and medicine for a New Era.
By characterizing THC/Cannabis as “harmful,” and maintaining control over this unique & essential natural resource, is wrong on every level. This precious resource has been manipulated by people who seek profit from the fear & pain of others.
Drugs don’t make seeds. Herbs do. Cannabis is from seeds, drugs are from Big Pharma. The drug treaties & drug laws we were all born into have always been “void for vagueness.”
It all began with maintaining the Great Lie of 1937 (that THC is “dangerous”), rather than admitting it is essential for optimum health, does several things, none of them good.
First, it attempts to justify the wrongful jurisdiction of unobjective courts, who profit from Cannabis prohibition in many ways.
Secondly, by claiming jurisdiction over an “herb bearing seed” the gods-given sanctity of Nature is subjugated by institutional disregard. Sincere respect for Natural systems & relationships, that predate mankind, are rendered legally inconsequential, to the detriment of human social evolution and global environmental integrity.
Finally, by exerting fees, taxes, financial burdens & punishments on the multi-billion dollar “marijuana” industry, institutional control of the multi-trillion dollar “industrial hemp” industry is maintained by the same people & politically powerful corporations presently vested in fossil fuels & nuclear energy.
Now that Cannabis has been revealed as essential to optimum human health, proper physical development, and sustainable existence on this planet, there is zero logic in perpetuating obsolete values imposed two generations ago, which have no bearing on today’s stark reality.
Extinction is in our proximate future unless Cannabis is recognized as mankind’s functional interface with the Natural Order. Anything less is just a tragic waste of time, for which our children will suffer the worst.
– what is the role of the Cannabis plant in the Biodiesel and green energies scenario?
– how can this plant help us to move towards a more sustainable-energy world?
One of the most interesting alternative to traditional and common feedstocks for biodiesel and biofuels in general is Cannabis.
Why Cannabis is an interesting raw material for biodiesel?
Biodiesel can be produced from a great variety of feedstocks: the choice for the best one depends largely on geography, climate and economics. For this reasons, today rapeseed and sunflower oils are mainly used in Europe, soybean oil and animal fats in the United States, palm oil in tropical Countries and corn and sugarcane in Brazil.
Thus, the choice of feedstock used for Biodiesel production does not follow criteria that pinpoint the most efficient raw material that could be grown for this purpose, but it’s rather based on the most available feedstock currently present in a Country.
In contrast to palm oil, sugar cane, maize, etc., Cannabis is a highly adaptable, fast-growing, annual plant that can be cultivated at most latitudes. In addition, Cannabis is oneof the few plants that produces high yields of both oil and biomass, which means it can be used to produce both biodiesel and bioethanol.
For this reasons, Cannabis has the potential to form the basis of a revolutionary fuel industry, internationally distributed because the plant can be efficiently grown almost anywhere, yet locally determined because consumers and communities can also be producers.
What kinds of green energies can be produced from the Cannabis plant?
There are many applications for the Cannabis plant in the textile, food, medical and building sectors, but its uses in the energy sector are not well known by the general public and not limited to biodiesel which is just one of many.
Examples of energy products that can be produced from Cannabis are: [3] , [4]
– heat produced from the combustion of briquettes or pellets made of Cannabis hurds and stems;
– electricity from Cannabis biomass through the use of Combined Heat and Power (CHP) engines;
– biogas from anaerobic digestion, a common natural process based on microbial degradation of biomass in the absence of oxygen, which generates methane;
– bioethanol obtained through fermentation, which is another natural process used by man since ancient times;
– biodiesel from Cannabis seed oil where the oil contained in the seeds is converted to biodiesel by a transesterification process with methanol;
Between the advantages of using Cannabis as a resource for biofuels we can now highlight at least 4 important points:
1) Cannabis produces annually high yields of both oil and biomass;
2) Cannabis can be efficiently used in crop rotations substituting the common crops, so no new arable land would be necessary;
3) Cannabis requires little pesticide;
4) Cannabis has the potential to decrease pesticide use in succeeding crops; [5] Today, the main feedstocks for biofuels like maize, soybean and sugar beet, require large quantities of pesticides so a biofuel production 100% based on these crops may not be a real green solution.
In fact, a responsible way of growing green oil crops should take under consideration the amount of pesticides the cultivar requires.
Pesticide use have a strong influence on:
a) the energy input in cultivation (due to high energy requirements for pesticide production)
b) the entire ecosystem
If you are interested in natural pesticides solution, check out our video on “Push-pull technologies, an eco friendly pest management system”.
In contrast with common feedstocks, Cannabis:
– can be grown even on “marginal” lands because it has low input requirements for cultivation;
– can be efficiently used as a preceding crop for the cultivation of cereals since it increases their yields from 10-20%;
– is a pest-resistant, highly adaptable plan;
– even in monoculture fields, it allows for a low pesticide use if followed by a well designed crop rotation;
– it is an annual plant that fits well in crop rotations and it has the ability to suppress soil pathogens opening the path for an healthier soil; [6], [7]
Cannabis biofuel: the advantages
– low pesticide requirements;
– good weed competition (less need for pesticides);
– suitability as break crop in cereal-oriented crop rotations;
– high biomass yield in relatively short time;
– low input requirements;
– economically feasible even for small-scale cultivation areas;
– unlike perennial crops it does not require any long term commitment for its cultivation;
All these aspects may be key elements for a more sustainable biofuel production from biomass in the next future.
So, why Cannabis is not already the main source for biofuels worldwide?
Today, after decades of prohibition, Cannabis is getting back to the legal market claiming its share in many sectors. Laws are changing and people has started to look at different alternatives.
But the reason why Cannabis is still not widely used for biofuels is very simple: today, the value of the crop’s fibre and seed is greater than the value of energy it would produce.
Economical competition on the energy level with petroleum-based fuels or other biofuels can be very challenging for Cannabis. Given the actual situation, incomes for farmers are greater if they sell their seed and fibre crops separately, which can better compete on the food and textile levels.
Right know, without the necessary infrastructure and subsidies by governments aiming to favour green energies instead of fossil fuels, the production of biofuels from Cannabis struggles to be profitable.
Cannabis has a good energy output-to-input ratio and is an above-average energy crop but it has been developed little as an industrial energetic crop over the past decades compared to other crops.
However, in comparison with other well-established food crops, Cannabis still has a great potential for improvement on both increased biomass yields and better conversion efficiencies into biofuel so we can be optimist for the next future.
What are Cannabis hurds and how can they contribute to make energy crop more competitive?
As we said, industrial Cannabis hemp is mainly cultivated for its high-quality fibres and high-value seed oil, but today the hurd, the woody core of the plant which constitutes up to 70% of the dry stalk matter, is a cellulose waste.
A better use of this waste material may contribute to rank Cannabis at the top of the most interesting plants for energy production. In fact, the efficient liberation of sugars from lignocellulosic biomass waste (like Cannabis hurds) not only would decrease solid waste handling, but it would also produce value-added biofuels and bio-based products such as bio-plastics.
Cannabis hurds are a form of lignocellulosic biomass which constitutes the most common raw material present in the world. Differently from wood species, Cannabis is an annual plant and its hurds chemical composition is pretty unique:
– on one hand it is very similar to that of wood species with a high content of carbohydrate (cellulose and hemicelluloses) containing sugars;
– on the other hand it has a very low percentage of lignin, thus favouring the extraction of cellulose from the plant material;
So far, Cannabis hurds still only have minor applications such as animal bedding, garden mulch or as a component of light-weight concrete; Cannabis hurds are an agroindustrial by-product with a high carbohydrate content so they are an excellent candidate for second-generation ethanol production.
Thus, the use of Cannabis hurds as a feedstock to produce ethanol may increase Cannabis attractiveness as a resource for biofuel and replace petrol as a transport fuel.
Conclusions:
Today, technologies to recover up to 96% of the sugar present in Cannabis hurds to transform it in ethanol already exist, but the problem is that they have not been introduced at an industrial scale yet.
Why Cannabis cultivation has the potential to make us move towards a greener world?
– it can promote environmentally beneficial methods of agriculture (especially via crop rotations), which could actually help secure a long-term strategy of land management, ensuring that food
shortages do not occur;
– it can generate the basis for a green economy, taking advantage of the many bio-products that can be derived from the Cannabis plant;
– it can be used for either food, fibre or as a bioremediation crop to restore unproductive land back to agricultural productivity while at the same time providing industrial quantities of cellulose for energy production;
The world urgently needs a replacement for fossil fuels, and cellulose derived ethanol seems to be an ideal industrial successor to them. With Cannabis we would replace an unsustainable industrial feedstock with one which is not only sustainable, but addresses some very serious environmental and socio-economic issues.
It is important to understand that neither Cannabis nor any other energy crop should become the only resource used on a global level for biofuels. Assisting to repeated large monoculture fields of Cannabis for biofuel production would be detrimental even for this highly adaptable plant.
A balanced mix between Cannabis and other crops may provide a solution, and it would be very short-sighted for society and industry to keep neglecting the Cannabis’ energy potential.
Cannabis is an environmentally friendly biodegradable alternative to both petrofuels and petroplastic and it will become more popular only when industrial mandates begin to favour environmental concerns for real.
An increased green consciousness between the general public followed by a bigger demand for natural products may be fundamental in triggering this process.
Here at Nature Going Smart we try to make people move towards a more nature-consciuos world.
Today we explained why Cannabis has the potential to be a real solution for a sustainable worldwide biofuel production.
All the rest is politics.
Deepen your knowledge on the biofuel topic checkin gout our articles “Solutions for biofuel: algae, non-edible oils & waste cooking oils“, “What is biodiesel” and “Drawbacks of modern production of biodiesel“.
