Will Oakland's Giant Pot Farms Be Green?
The massive indoor medical cannabis grows will consume huge amounts of electricity. But will the city make sure they don't add to greenhouse-gas emissions?
By Robert Gammon
Cannabis is usually considered to be a "green" product, but when Oakland's four giant indoor medical marijuana growing operations receive permits early next year, they could become the largest energy consumers in the city. They also could become the biggest sources of greenhouse gas emissions in Oakland — unless the city tightly regulates them.
No one knows for sure precisely how much energy the four indoor facilities will use, because they've never before been constructed on such a massive scale in the United States. But the intense lighting required to grow marijuana indoors in an industrialized setting — up to two football fields in size or larger — is expected to use so much electricity that outfitting them with solar panels likely will do little to offset their total energy consumption.
In an interview, Oakland City Councilwoman Rebecca Kaplan, the co-author of the large cannabis farm law, said the city plans to address the energy-consumption issue as it develops administrative guidelines in the months ahead. She said Oakland likely will mandate energy-efficient lighting, give preference to bidders who put solar panels on the roofs of their warehouses, and require that the farms offer "community benefits" packages to the city.
Kaplan said she did not include such mandates in the new law approved by the council last week because of a request by the Oakland City Attorney's Office. The city attorney noted that if the city decided to later adjust the mandates — to either strengthen or weaken them or add new ones — it would require a cumbersome process of getting the council to reapprove the law. As a result, the city plans to proffer a set of administrative regulations that will govern the pot farms.
The Berkeley City Council, by contrast, decided to include basic environmental mandates on its new large medical cannabis growing operations should voters approve them on the November ballot. The council has asked voters to approve six large medical cannabis growing operations in West Berkeley. Each would be up to 30,000 square-feet in size, or about two-thirds the size of a football field.
The farms, however, could become bigger if two or more of the growing operations combine into a single giant space, said Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates. In that case, the industrialized grows could rival the ones coming to Oakland. "They're going to require a huge amount of energy," Bates noted. "They're going to be a huge drain on our electrical system."
Because solar panels are expected to have so little impact on energy use at the indoor farms, the Berkeley council decided to include in the ballot measure a mandate that the growing operations "provide for an energy offset" equal to the amount of extra electricity the farms consume compared to other similarly sized industrial uses. Bates explained that the farms will be required to pay into a fund that Berkeley will use to plant trees and finance energy-efficiency measures in low-income residences throughout the city. That way, the new pot farms won't increase Berkeley's overall greenhouse-gas emissions.
The Berkeley council also wrote into its ballot measure a provision requiring the large farms to "use organic methods in cultivation and processing to the maximum extent possible." It's a nasty little secret in the medical marijuana world that many growers spray their plants liberally with pesticides — not unlike much the rest of the US agricultural industry.
Like Oakland, Berkeley plans to solicit bids for the new cultivation operations, and Bates said that the city will give preference to bidders who promise to employ organic growing methods. Kaplan said Oakland also plans to give preference to organic operations. The city also plans to require catchment systems for wastewater runoff, she said.
Jeff Wilcox, founder of AgraMed, a nonprofit that plans to bid to become one of Oakland's big growers, said his warehouse next to Interstate 880 will be LEED certified. He also plans to install solar panels, possibly use an onsite natural-gas generator, and stay away from pesticides. "The goal," he said, "should be to do as little damage as possible to the environment."
Berkeley, meanwhile, also plans to encourage bidders to consider outdoor growing operations that use virtually no energy at all. Bates believes that the rooftops of large warehouses could be suitable for big grows. Oakland, by contrast, plans to discourage outdoor grows because of crime concerns.
Many medical cannabis growers prefer cultivating indoors because they have much more control over growing operations. Nearly all Oakland producers grow indoors. They also believe it gives them a more marketable product, said Dale Gieringer of NORML, who supports outdoor growing. "Indoor growing uses a ton of energy," he said, "but everybody in the business tells me you can't sell outdoor pot — that it doesn't look good enough; you can't get the little bud package that looks cute."
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Is growing marijuana indoors green? I think we need to look at the energy consuming aspects of indoor growing vs. the alternatives.
1. How green is the manufacture and research of pharmaceutical drugs? Medical marijuana replaces prescription drugs (sometimes) and so the carbon footprint of the pharmaceutical industry must be considered.
2. How green is alcohol production? Undoubtedly, some people substitute between the two products. This is more of a recreational usage vs medical usage.
When we compare the environmental costs of indoor marijuana growing against the pharmaceutical and alcohol industries, I'm sure marijuana doesn't look too bad. However, I don't have any hard facts. Anyone out there have a good resource?
How much is it costing the Taxplayer (copyright 2010 "Chance").to run the illegal invasion of
Iraq?..How much to run the war in Afghanistan?
New air force base outside Kabul to be the
biggest in the world..Next to the largest Opium
fields in the world...Hmmmm, maybe some will
get shipped out?...
Billions for war but no juice for Weed?
Nicola Tesla invented AC and had a way of
beaming free electricity to your building
but J.P. Morgan didn't want free electricity
to the peons so he broke Tesla..
Look up Nicola Tesla...where did all
his research papers go when he died?
...I think the Department of Immigration
stole his research and buried it...
Free electricity via Tesla...Ask your
city government about that!
"Chance"
Good Lord; It sounds like someone is worried
about the cost of electricity? We taxplayers,
yes, I wrote TAXPLAYER, just gave Pakistan
$7.5 Billion...We have two wars and a trillion
dollar debt for Iraq and Afghanistan..
If the medical weed helps one American it
is justified...
I enlisted in Oakland in 1969..Vietnam in
1970-71 and was wounded, blown up and gassed
with Agent White,Blue and Orange..
I am usually in pain but can't smoke
weed because it is illegal for a Combat
Veteran to smoke weed in New Mexico...
..More weed, less war and kia's..eh?
"Chance"
To reduce greenhouse gas emissions due to power consumption, the use of actual greenhouses to grow seems logical.
Wall-to-wall rooftop solar panels and mandatory LED grow-lighting would be a second-best solution.
When the black market price support disappears, the cost of electricity will make natural light the ONLY way. Get ready for THAT.
-Richard Steeb, San Jose
Yes, but: the people planning these huge operations aren't interested in natural light - they want 24x7 high output grow lights. That's why these things will be such an environmental hit. I'm glad to hear that at least one of the prospective big growers plans to have his site LEED certified, because I have zero confidence in the City of Oakland's ability to regulate these things in any meaningful way.
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