Environmental economists tend to think everything boils down to energy. In the case of cannabis, that might actually be true. The THC-infused gummy you popped after work, the boutique pre-roll you grabbed from your local dispensary… They each come with an invisible environmental bill. Like most things these days. Except, maybe, it’s steeper than you’d expect. Especially considering we’re talking about a plant. Duh.
Have you ever wondered how many kilowatt-hours it takes to grow weed? Or how many gallons of water it guzzled on its way to your grinder?
Cannabis is now one of the most resource-intensive crops in North America. And much of that burden stems not from the plant itself, but from the political architecture that surrounds legal cannabis. Indoor cultivation has become the dominant mode in many U.S. states because federal prohibition locks production within state borders. The result is High-yield, high-potency cannabis grown under LED arrays, HVAC systems, and pumped-in CO2, all of which come at a steep environmental cost. And that’s highly inefficient.
And it’s also highly inefficient. I’m not an expert (editor’s note: he is! Just too humble to acknowledge it himself), but some trustworthy sources have stated many times that both yields and quality can often be achieved outdoors or in greenhouses using a free and vastly underutilized energy source in cannabis: the sun.
So if you’re a user who also cares about climate change and the environmental impact of your consumption, stick around. We’re about to dive into some hard science and unpack the real ecological footprint behind your favorite flower.
Worse Than Bitcoin
Until recently, there was little data on the environmental impact of cannabis. That changed in 2021, when a team at Colorado State University published the first peer-reviewed life-cycle …
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Author: Rolando García / High Times
