Cannabis Hemp. . .Marijuana! Essays - Biofuels, Bioenergy, Herbs

Cannabis Hemp. . .Marijuana! Article copied work for work from April 1990 Issue of High Times Magazine pages 37-41 and page 57. "OUR CHALLENGE TO THE WORLD: TRY TO PROVE US WRONG-- If all fossil fuels and their derivatives (coal, oil, natural gas, synthetic fibers and petrochemicals) as well as the deforestation of trees for paper and agriculture (e.g., Brazilian & Indonesian rainforests), are banned from use in order to save the planet, preserve the ozone layer and reverse the greenhouse effect with its global warming trend: Then there is only one known renewable natural resource able to provide all(underlined) of the following goods and essentials such as paper and textiles; meet all of the world's transportation, home and industrial energy needs, and clean the atmosphere-- all at the same time--our old standby that did it all before: Cannabis Hemp. . .Marijuana! The industrial revolution moved hemp to a place of lesser importance in world commerce due to the lack of mechanized harvesting and breaking technology needed for mass production. But this natural resource was far too valuable to be relegated to the back burner of history forever. In 1916, a U.S. Department of Agriculture bulletin predicted that once a docortication and harvesting machine was developed, cannabis would again become America's largest agricultural industry. Some 22 years later, Popular Mechanics introduced a new generation of investors to just such a device, (See the February 1989 issue of HIGH TIMES.) which brings us to this next bit of history: A PLAN TO SAVE OUR FOREST Some canniabis plant strains regularly reach treelike heights of 20 feet or more in one growing season. In 1916, the U.S. Department of Agriculture wrote in special bulletin No. 404 that one acre of cannabis hemp, in annual rotation over a 20-year period, would produce as much pulp for paper as 4.1 acres of trees over the same 20- year period being cut down; and this process would use only 1/5 to 1/7 as much sulfur-based acid chemicals to break down the glue-like lignin that binds with the fibers of the pulp. All this lignin must be broken down to make pulp paper. Hemp is only 4% lignin, while trees are 18-30% lignin. Thus hemp provides four times as much pulp with five to seven times less pollution (and yet, today is totally illegal, as it has been for the last half-century). This hemp pulp-paper potential depended on the invention and engineering of new machines for stripping the hemp by modern technology. This would also lower the cost of and demand for lumber for housing and at the same time help re-oxygenate the planet. As an example: If the new (1916) hemp pulp paper process were legal today, it would soon replace about 70% of all wood pulp paper, including computer printout paper, corrugated boxes and paper bags. Pulp paper made from rags or machined from 60% to 100% hemp hurds is stronger and more flexible than paper made from wood pulp and makes a less expensive, more ecological paper, and a better one. CONSERVATION & SOURCE REDUCTION Source reduction is a cost-cutting waste control method often called for by environmentalists: reduction of the source of pollution, usually from manufacturing with petrochemicals or their derivatives. In the supermarket when you are asked to choose paper or plastic for your bags, you are faced with an environmental dilemma; paper from trees that were cut, or plastic bags made from fossil fuel and chemicals. With a third choice--hemp hurd paper--available, one could choose a biodegradable, durable paper from an annually renuewable source, the hemp plant. The goal is to reduce the source of pollution. Whether the source of the pollution is CFC's (chloro-flourocarbons) from spray cans, computers and refrigeration, or tritium and plutonium produced for military uses, or the sulfuric acids used by papermakers, reducing the source of pollution is the goal. The environmental advantages of harvesting hemp annually--leaving the trees in the ground!--make papermaking from hemp hurds critical for source reduction, along with the use of hemp to replace fossil fuel as an energy source. ENERGY AND THE ECONOMY The book Solar Gas (1980), Science Digest, Omni Magazine, The Alliance for Survival, the "Green Party" of West Germany and others put the total figure of our energy costs at 80% of the total dollar expenses of living for each human being. In validation: 82% of the total value of all issues traded on the New York Stock Exchange, other world stock exchanges, ect., are tied directly to: *Energy supply companies (Exxon, Shell,