Marijuana is one of the least “green,” most energy-intensive crops there is. That is the dirty little secret that no “woke” groups or climate terrorists wish to acknowledge. The recent surge in its acceptance, legality, and use, is, therefore, making it a rapidly growing source of greenhouse gases.

Since pot is grown mostly indoors and requires special lighting and environmental controls that consume up to 2,000 watts of electricity per square meter, it is responsible for inordinately high levels of energy consumption...like 40 times that needed to produce leafy greens such as lettuce. But, hey, you can’t smoke lettuce. (At any rate, it is hard to keep lit.)

How bad is pot cultivation for mother earth? A research report titled, “Energy Use by the Indoor Cannabis Industry: Inconvenient Truths for Producers, Consumers, and Policymakers,” introduces readers to the fact that the ever-growing pot-growing industry is already responsible for over 1% of all electricity consumption in the United States.

If true, that is a mind-blowing statistic. Think about it. Of all the myriad energy uses in existence, from air-conditioning and heating to televisions and refrigerators, to massive sports stadiums and concert halls, to 24-hour-a-day big-box grocery stores and downtown skyscrapers, to the military-industrial complex, etc., etc., growing pot uses one one-hundredth of all the electricity consumption in the U.S.?!! That’s, like, so rad! Or sad.

Politico recently provided several examples of the vast energy consumption currently required to grow marijuana:

• researchers estimate that ganja growing accounted for 10% of total industrial electricity consumption in Massachusetts last year.
• a study reported that the energy required to grow enough marijuana to make a single joint (one gram) was equivalent to the energy used to drive a fuel-efficient car 20 miles.
• a report out of Europe found that each average indoor pot-growing operation uses more power than 14 average homes.

Politico noted that the problem will only get worse as more states legalize wacky weed. Already over one-third of the country—over 100 million people—lives in states where pot is legal for those 21 and older. As more states legalize pot, the groundwork will be laid for the further skyrocketing of electricity consumption created by the new markets.

But, like, dude -- don’t harsh my mellow.

Image: Marijuana by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. Public domain

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