Is hemp a valuable industrial product... is it a drug...is it both?
A friend of mine has suggested that Hemp has the potential to be one of our best future products if we can just get it out of the courtroom and into the production facility.
Here is what she has to say... Big business, including DuPont who had just developed a chemical process for pulping paper and others prevented the production of Hemp in the US...first in the 1930s when it was considered a drug, in competition with alcohol, then repealed its abolition for world war II production (1940) of hemp based products, but reinstated in 1957 and held to today due to DEA promoted laws against Cannabis.
It turns out that industrial Hemp... though from the Cannabis family...is not Marijuana...and has a very low level of THC, the drug found in the Cannabis used for marijuana.
One advocate of the 1930s argued that there were more than 25000 products that could be made... Good intentions aside...what industrial hemp can not be used for is the production of
'Joints' for the drug using crowd...it is not the same plant.
But, really, what can it be used for that we would immediately want?
1) fiber for improved production of paper...in fact the paper industry is actively petitioning for its growth...they have already proven its worth using imported Hemp from Canada...you see the fibers are not the issue...so hemp fiber is allowed, but you can't grow it...so it is imported from places like Canada and Indonesia...
A friend of mine has suggested that Hemp has the potential to be one of our best future products if we can just get it out of the courtroom and into the production facility.
Here is what she has to say... Big business, including DuPont who had just developed a chemical process for pulping paper and others prevented the production of Hemp in the US...first in the 1930s when it was considered a drug, in competition with alcohol, then repealed its abolition for world war II production (1940) of hemp based products, but reinstated in 1957 and held to today due to DEA promoted laws against Cannabis.
It turns out that industrial Hemp... though from the Cannabis family...is not Marijuana...and has a very low level of THC, the drug found in the Cannabis used for marijuana.
One advocate of the 1930s argued that there were more than 25000 products that could be made... Good intentions aside...what industrial hemp can not be used for is the production of
'Joints' for the drug using crowd...it is not the same plant.
But, really, what can it be used for that we would immediately want?
1) fiber for improved production of paper...in fact the paper industry is actively petitioning for its growth...they have already proven its worth using imported Hemp from Canada...you see the fibers are not the issue...so hemp fiber is allowed, but you can't grow it...so it is imported from places like Canada and Indonesia...
hemp fiber
You see, industrial hemp does not have a high level of THC (less than 1%) in industrial the strain ( Cannabis Sativa plant).
So...paper first...then just the boon to the farm industry...it grows quickly, can yield two or more crops a year...and it does not need much attention...less herbicides and pesticides, less fertilizer too.
And a second industry...that's two of 25000... would be for the production of Biomass for fuel. It turns out it can be used in this form for several things...including low carbon burning (reduced or no greenhouse gasses) with little or no smoke residue. And it can be used to create alcohol for fuel as well... replacing the demand on corn and releasing these grains back to the food industry.
So, there you have some if it...what do you think?
take a shot and write in on this one...
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