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View Poll Results: Should marijuana legalization be reconsidered if it means more global warming?
Non-AGW denier and pothead, but keep it illegal to save the planet. 0 0%
Non AGW denier, but LEGALIZE IT regardless, even if it dooms the planet. 0 0%
AGW skeptic, legalize it. 3 50.00%
AGW skeptic, keep it illegal, but just for reasons other than global warming. 3 50.00%
Voters: 6. You may not vote on this poll

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Old 05-20-2014, 06:02 PM
 
Location: Old Bellevue, WA
18,782 posts, read 17,294,414 times
Reputation: 7990

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Here's a very well done story from C.R Roberts at the Tacoma News Tribune:
Power and water: Will feds allow it for pot? | Business | The News Tribune

It's primarily about how federal agencies are going to deal with the issue of water and power use for marijuana cultivation in WA and CO, the two states that have legalized MJ. But there is an interesting side issue, namely the carbon footprint of MJ cultivation.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tacoma News Trib
The manufacture of one joint – a marijuana cigarette – will produce 1.5 kilograms of CO2 emissions, equal to the emissions of a 44-mpg hybrid car driving 22 miles. The energy used is equal to that used to produce 18 pints of beer.


U.S. electricity use for cannabis production is the equivalent of 1.7 million average homes, or the production of seven average U.S. power plants.
It makes sense; after all we've all seen the stories about how mj grow operations were busted because some detective noticed obscene power bills. Or flew over the mj grow house with thermal imaging gear.
Police helicopter using thermal imaging to see indoor grows? - Indoor Medical Marijuana Growing

If mj cultivation has this kind of massive carbon footprint, do we need to rethink? Nip it in the bud when it comes to pot legalization? If there is a conflict between pot legalization and anthropogenic global warming (AGW) which is most important?
]Read more here: Power and water: Will feds allow it for pot? | Business | The News Tribune

Last edited by wutitiz; 05-20-2014 at 06:12 PM..
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Old 05-20-2014, 06:18 PM
 
Location: Old Bellevue, WA
18,782 posts, read 17,294,414 times
Reputation: 7990
The TNT has updated this story. It's not really germane to the question of pot and global warming, but informative nonetheless. The US Bureau of Reclamation has ruled that it will NOT allow federal water to be used to grow pot:
WASHINGTON: Feds won’t allow water for pot growers | Business | The News Tribune

Quote:
Originally Posted by TNT
The ruling makes clear that the Obama administration is willing to set limits on the states’ legalization experiments, even though the Justice Department said in August that it would not block their plans to tax and sell the drug.

The agency began informing members of Congress of its decision at 11 a.m. today.

DuBray said the federal agency will conduct its operations “in a manner that is consistent with the Controlled Substances Act,” which bans marijuana.


And if the agency becomes aware of any federally-controlled water being used on marijuana crops, it will refer cases to the Department of Justice for possible prosecution, he said.
Pres Obama harshes the buzz of the pro-legalization movement.[LEFT]
Read more here: WASHINGTON: Feds won’t allow water for pot growers | Business | The News Tribune
[/LEFT]
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Old 05-20-2014, 06:22 PM
 
Location: Montreal, Quebec
15,082 posts, read 14,267,980 times
Reputation: 9789
Will they still allow water for golf courses? They use over a million gallons a day...each.
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Old 05-20-2014, 06:24 PM
Status: "Ephesians 6:12" (set 27 days ago)
 
45,047 posts, read 26,201,042 times
Reputation: 24789
Get rid of the ethanol mandate and farmers would start growing a crop that consumers actually wanted.

Oh then there is the NSA data center in utah that uses over 1.7 million gallons of water per day. The guv could shut that down and only a handful of paranoid control freaks would give a damn.
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Old 05-20-2014, 06:24 PM
 
Location: Vancouver, B.C., Canada
11,155 posts, read 29,192,950 times
Reputation: 5479
umm pretty sure marijuana is a weed and grows pretty much everywhere if we use or Remember B.C., Western Washington and PNW Bud Grown Hydro-power and we have lots of eater in fact ewe are flooding in some regions right now so why waste all that electricity and excess freshwater when pot could be grown and sold and taxed and build so infrastructure
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Old 05-20-2014, 06:29 PM
 
Location: A Nation Possessed
25,344 posts, read 18,489,446 times
Reputation: 22217
Naw, go ahead and keep it legal. I've never met a stoned person yet that stresses about global warming. I think everyone who stresses about global warming should take up pot smoking (or eating marijuana brownies, if you're concerned about the ill effects on your lungs) immediately. Life would be fun again.
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Old 05-20-2014, 08:54 PM
 
Location: planet octupulous is nearing earths atmosphere
13,620 posts, read 12,692,471 times
Reputation: 20050
its all ways good to have a comedy thread from time to time..


get rid of wineries.

get rid of golf courses.

get rid of lawns.

get rid of illegal aliens they use a sheet load of water and the reproduce at an alarming rate!!!


why pick on one without the others...
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Old 05-20-2014, 09:24 PM
 
Location: Southern California
15,083 posts, read 20,414,314 times
Reputation: 10343
I'd rather be allowed to grow weed in my back yard and make some money instead of growing a lawn only to have it sit there and look pretty.

[$$$]
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Old 05-20-2014, 09:49 PM
 
Location: Victoria, BC.
33,501 posts, read 37,011,343 times
Reputation: 13972
Your poll is biased without this choice..

Non AGW denier, but LEGALIZE IT because it will have no effect on the planet.... Mary Jane is a plant...If grown outdoors it consumes CO2 like any other plant...When used it releases the CO2 it consumed, so adds no new CO2 emissions to the atmosphere, and what water used to grow it returns to the earth's water cycle.
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Old 05-20-2014, 09:59 PM
 
1,825 posts, read 1,413,711 times
Reputation: 540
You do realize that Marijuana being illegal is the single biggest reason as to why it is so carbon intensive. To spell it out all that energy use is due to the fact that marijuana is done primarily in indoor grows for obvious reasons. Namely you cannot just plant a field of marijuana like you would do with tobacco. The reason for this is because that would be obvious to law enforcement. As such grows are forced indoors where sunlight has to be simulated and creating fake sunlight requires an enormous amount of energy, energy that would not be used if you could utilize, well, real sunlight.

As such your poll is nonsensical. Making pot illegal is why it has such a high carbon cost. Were it legal to grow like most cash crops the cost benefits of outdoor growing would drastically reduce the viability of indoor growing and thus greatly reduce the carbon inputs in growing.

Serious though, don't let common sense get in the way of the tricky false choice dilemmas you want to present to the libruhls.
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