Greening the Green « Terrain Magazine, Winter 2007 « Ecology Center
According to a 2006 report by Dr. Jon B. Gettman of Shepherd University, California leads the nation in indoor and outdoor marijuana production. It is the state’s largest cash crop, generating nearly $14 billion, more than grapes, vegetables, and hay combined. Moreover, production has increased ten-fold in the last 25 years. Much of that production takes place in marginal and remote areas, where ATVs power up hills to tiny outcrops, generators thunder day and night, and water trucks suck water out of tiny creeks.Humboldt County supervising environmental health specialist Melissa Martel says that diesel bioaccumulates in aquatic species and continues up the food chain. “The coating action of diesel oil can kill algae, insects, fish and birds,” she says. “Studies indicate that 50 percent of fish will die when exposed to about 1 teaspoon of diesel in 25 gallons of water.”
Diesel setups are so prevalent that Martel gives advice on setting up safe fuel conveyance systems. “The growers that we investigate aren’t the peace-loving, organic-growing hippies that you might imagine. We find 100-KW generators with multiple 10,000-gallon diesel storage tanks sitting on the ground, commonly in a creek drainage with good riparian coverage, with makeshift piping, hoses, and no seismic support. Not surprisingly, grows are too frequently discovered by CDF or local volunteer fire [fighters] when the grow and surrounding trees are on fire.”
You know what crops aren’t causing huge environmental concerns in California? Grapes, vegetables, and hay, because those items are legal to grow and farmers must follow environmental regulations. Once again, it is the prohibition of marijuana that makes it so profitable to farm illegally in the remote forests of the Golden State.
When people can grow marijuana legally, these problems don’t exist:
“There is a serious distinction to be made. Many medical [legal] marijuana growers are some of the most responsible citizens around. They buy soil in bulk, use rat traps instead of poison, water with timers and drip systems. They have very little physical impact on the land. I’m not up against legal growers. The ones I’m concerned with are the ones polluting the environment in the name of huge profits. The plants are seasonal, but the environmental damage lasts forever.”
