Hemp, a clean Renewable fuel source

[editec]

Hemp could be a very useful agricultural plant no doubt.

But I grow sceptical that any bio mass product is the solution to our energy problems even if we could grow enough of the stuff..

They are STILL hydrocrabon based sources of energy, no different that coal or oil.

We need to stop spewing C02 into the air, and get with solar energy.

 

[matty]

You can't grow it in any meaningful way unless you have huge amounts of land devoted to it. I mean, we agree it does need LAND to grow, right? I don't think a bunch of stoners growing it hydroponically are really going to make much of a dint on the energy requirements of the US.

Hemp 4 Fuel - Clean Energy Solutions

 

[matty]

We need to stop spewing C02 into the air, and get with solar energy.

we also, then, need to stop this endless cycle of water vaporization as well.

 

[Paulie]

Hemp could be a very useful agricultural plant no doubt.

But I grow sceptical that any bio mass product is the solution to our energy problems even if we could grow enough of the stuff..

They are STILL hydrocrabon based sources of energy, no different that coal or oil.

We need to stop spewing C02 into the air, and get with solar energy.

See, the thing is, we're not (at least I'm not) trying to say that hemp is the be all end all. It would be a great contributor to alternate energy though, ALONG with wind, solar, and nuclear.

A little bit of everything, plus using some of our own oil, will significantly reduce our dependence on foreign energy.

But no, Allie comes in and pisses all over the idea like she knows what the fuck she's talking about. The only way we can produce hemp is to clear all our forests. What a bunch of fucking brain dead bullshit.

I can't tell you how much wasted barren land I drive by all the time, and that's just where I live. This country is full of prime land that could be used to produce plenty of hemp. Perhaps not all that would be needed to completely be independent of any other energy source, but it sure could make a pretty big difference.

You're right though Allie. Fuck all that. Let's just keep invading countries to maintain our petrodollar hegemony.

 

[busara]

You are so incredibly full of it.

You can't grow it in any meaningful way unless you have huge amounts of land devoted to it. I mean, we agree it does need LAND to grow, right? I don't think a bunch of stoners growing it hydroponically are really going to make much of a dint on the energy requirements of the US.

As with any crop, to grow it, you need clear land. Do we have clear land? Yes. It's being used to grow FOOD CROPS. Do you suggest we eliminate the food crops to grow hemp?

Or do you suggest we clear land to grow hemp? If we're going to clear land for hemp, my question stands...why the hell don't we just harvest our TREES for cellulose? They certainly can produce more than annual plants.

it is being done. well, lumber biproducts
Company plans to build plant to convert pine to ethanol | SavannahNow.com

the problem is that trees grow slowly, with a few exceptions.
Fast-growing trees could take root as future energy source

it is difficult and costly to convert cellulose to ethanol. and, as you stated, land will be needed. but one of the advantages of hemp is that it grows almost anywhere, including land that has no farms because it is widely infertile. there is also subsidized land (i know, complicated, but its there unused) youre talking like we'll need to clear appalichia to grow biofuels, which isnt the case. we'll have to clear some land, but how much depends on what is grown. and plants like hemp and switchgrass are far more effective than corn

 

[busara]

Hemp could be a very useful agricultural plant no doubt.

But I grow sceptical that any bio mass product is the solution to our energy problems even if we could grow enough of the stuff..

They are STILL hydrocrabon based sources of energy, no different that coal or oil.

We need to stop spewing C02 into the air, and get with solar energy.

solar will never be able to power the country alone. remember, plants absorb CO2. so crops like hemp would absorb, then be released, then absorbed....
not completely neutral, but close, which is a lot better than oil.

 

[matty]

Thanks for the post, the links; I'll look at them.

And if you see the link I added in here somewhere, it estimates 6% of contiguous landuse needed. I've seen that and estimates like it a few times.

 

[matty]

solar will never be able to power the country alone. remember, plants absorb CO2. so crops like hemp would absorb, then be released, then absorbed....
not completely neutral, but close, which is a lot better than oil.

It always disturbs me when they leave out the fact hemp would absorb CO2, and yet they talk about hanging bags of algae in warehouses? Fubar.

 

[matty]

Hemp For Fuel

"...FARMERS MUST BE ALLOWED TO GROW an energy crop capable of producing 10 tons per acre in 90-120 days. This crop must be woody in nature and high in lignocellulose. It must be able to grow in all climactic zones in America.

And it should not compete with food crops for the most productive land, but be grown in rotation with food crops or on marginal land where food crop production isn't profitable.

When farmers can make a profit growing energy, it will not take long to get 6% of continental American land mass into cultivation of biomass fuel--enough to replace our economy's dependence on fossil fuels. We will no longer be increasing the C02 burden in the atmosphere. The threat of global greenhouse warming and adverse climactic change will diminish. To keep costs down, pyrolysis reactors need to be located within a 50 mile radius of the energy farms. This necessity will bring life back to our small towns by providing jobs locally.

HEMP IS THE NUMBER ONE biomass producer on planet earth: 10 tons per acre in approximately four months. It is a woody plant containing 77% cellulose. Wood produces 60% cellulose. This energy crop can be harvested with equipment readily available. It can be "cubed" by modifying hay cubing equipment. This method condenses the bulk, reducing trucking costs from the field to the pyrolysis reactor. And the biomass cubes are ready for conversion with no further treatment.

Hemp is drought resistant, making it an ideal crop in the dry western regions of the country. Hemp is the only biomass resource capable of making America energy independent. And our government outlawed it in 1938..."

 

[AllieBaba]

Silly potheads.
It's a harmless fantasy, but still a fantasy.

 

[busara]

Silly potheads.
It's a harmless fantasy, but still a fantasy.

you realize you cant smoke hemp, right? well, you could, but it would be rather pointless. it has less than 1% THC. Marijuana has 10-20%

 

[AllieBaba]

I realize that. It's still potheads who always go for this.

 

[busara]

I realize that. It's still potheads who always go for this.

guess im a pothead for wanting the most efficient crops to be used for ethanol (rolls eyes)

 

[Paulie]

Silly potheads.
It's a harmless fantasy, but still a fantasy.

Which you've provided absolutely no rebuttal to, like usual.

 

[Paulie]

I realize that. It's still potheads who always go for this.

As opposed to the bible thumpers who don't.

 

[Gunny]

Chapter 9: Clean Renewable Fuel

Farming only 6% of the continental U.S. with biomass would provide all of America’s oil and gas energy needs, thus ending our dependence on fossil fuels. Hemp is the number one net biomass source on Earth: capable of producing 10 tons per acre in four months.

THIS from WIKI: []Error


The decision of the United States Congress to pass the 1937 Marijuana Tax Act was based in part on testimony derived from articles in newspapers owned by William Randolph Hearst, who had significant financial interests in the timber industry, which manufactured his newsprint. The background material also included that from 1880 to 1933 the hemp grown in the United States had declined from 15,000 to 1,200 acres (4.9 km²), and that the price of line hemp had dropped from $12.50 per pound in 1914 to $9.00 per pound in 1933.[19][20] In 1935, however, hemp would also make a significant rebound.[20] Hearst began a campaign against hemp, and published stories in his newspapers associating hemp with marijuana[21] and attacking marijuana usage.[22] As a result of the act, the production and use of hemp was discontinued.

I agree. It kept ME fueled for a few years!

 

[Charles_Main]

Hell yes!!

Hemp would make much more sense than using Corn or Soy, It can be grown in places those others can not. In places like the bad lands of the US.

The only reason we do not use it, is our government has demonized it, and equated it with Weed, which it is not. go ahead try smoking some Industrial Hemp. I assure you all you will get is a bad headache.

Very good Idea, we should be using this today. It is a shame that we allow China to lead the world in Industrial hemp production out of unfounded paranoia about weed.

Oh and I am not a pot head, I DO NOT smoke weed.

Charles

 

[Taco]

I realize that. It's still potheads who always go for this.

Well, potheads and Canada. And of course, before the lies that led to its' criminalization, us too.

Trouble is, you don't really know much about the stuff. Which is ok. But you might consider...I dunno...reading?

 

[Taco]

Another thought-

Does anyone know how much edible matter is yielded from hemp? I know the seeds are one of the more nutritious food sources known to man (EFA's, Protein, Vitamins E & D, Fiber, etc..)? Those EFA's are the good Omega3 kind, with the anti-inflammatory, cardio-protective protective properties. No other substance in nutrition has been more studied, or it's benefits more widely validated scientifically.

I don't know the ratios, but the high quality protein and GLA are valuable products; and the protein is high quality and dense, like animal meat. Its fibers are useful for softening stool (Chinese medicine has used hemp to treat intestinal problems for centuries).

So I don’t know to what extent, but it seems as if Hemp farms should also produce a certain amount of dense, vital nutrients (not to mention, fibers for other industries). Hemp plants require little in the way of pesticide use. They are hardy, grow in all climates, and replace themselves rapidly. You don’t need primo farmland to grow hemp. Remember Victory Gardens? Remember when America responded to a crisis by being proactive, frugal, and doing things for themselves? Seeing as Hemp can grow almost anywhere, I could easily envision smaller scale farms, and smaller, more localized distribution networks. And here’s where it will get tricky – infrastructure needs if we are looking at a multi-fuel approach…. How will that limit us?

Lot’s of tough questions there. But, rather than throw my hands up and make a sarcastic, negative, teen-angsty dismissive joke about it, I recognize, that we don’t really have other options but to try.

So although Ravi has a point about the unfeasibility of converting all the needed land to replace oil with biomass (estimates are, we'd need a field about the size of Africa to just replace the gas in the cars), it doesn't have to be so 'all or nothing', and I don't think any of the researchers are operating under any such delusions. It's like other have said - the "solution: with really be diversification of means of collections and application. Diversification of energy supplies is our only choice. Some oil, some coil, some wind, some geo-thermal, some.

And let’s be clear- there will be less driving. We’ll need whatever supplies of petroleum we have left (by the time we ever develop the alternatives), for more critical products, like my new computers and knee replacements. Is the future to have no MMPORPG’s? Are we ready for that kind of austerity?

We better be.

The Oil Drum | Discussions about Energy and Our Future

 

[Gunny]

I realize that. It's still potheads who always go for this.

Do you think it is possible for you to be so narrow-minded on a wider array of topics than you already are?

What logic has brought you to the conclusion that anyone who wants to consume marijuana themselves wants to waste it in their vehicles?

I have no problem with using it if it works and I CAN'T smoke weed ... I'm allergic to it. Kind of blows your "pothead" theory out of the water, doesn't it?

Hemp is not pot any-damned-way, you ignoramus. Hemp is made from the stems, not the buds, and no one that calls themselves a pot smoker is going to smoke the stems. Pot smokers go to some effort as a matter of fact to ensure all the stems and seeds are cleaned out of what they smoke.

Try getting your facts straight before making such an uniformed comment denigrating people you obviously don't know a damned thing about.