cannabisnews.com: Industrial Hemp Can Save The World Industrial Hemp Can Save The World Posted by FoM on March 16, 2002 at 19:53:21 PT By Sarah Perfetto Source: Napa Valley Register Do you ever stop and think about what will happen when we've squeezed every last drop of fossil fuel out of our earth and destroyed every bit of land searching for more? It won't be a happy day; cars will die and lights will dim; 85 percent of our energy comes from fossil fuels.Do you ever wonder what happens to all the plastic packaging we throw away? It sits in a landfill polluting the soil beneath it because it's non-biodegradable. How will you feel when all the old growth forests have been slaughtered for our consumption? These forests will not renew themselves for hundreds and thousands of years.If I were to tell you industrial hemp could solve these problems and many more, would you believe me? Me, a 16-year-old Temescal High School student, what do I know about all this? Well, maybe a little more than you. So please hear me out.* Bio-diesel fuel can be made from hemp seed oil, corn oil and animal fats. So why not use corn or animal fat? Hemp seed oil can produce 10 times the methanol than corn and to use animal fat may upset vegetarians and animal rights activists. It is the only alternative fuel in the U.S. to complete the Environmental Protection Agency's Tier II Health Effects Testing under section 211 (b) of the Clean Air Act: http://www.epa.gov/otaq/consumer/fuels/oxypanel/kortum.pdf It is compatible to fuel any unmodified diesel engine car. Production and use produces about 80 percent less carbon dioxide emissions and almost 100 percent less sulfur dioxide. Farming only 6 percent of the U.S. acreage with biomass crops such as hemp would provide for all of America's extensive energy needs.Which brings me to this point: why are we wasting all this money on imported fossil fuels when we can make all we need right here and use them to help boost our economy? It would provide many new jobs and could be sold or traded to other countries helping to clear our national debt.* Replacing Trees: Hemp fiber is the strongest of the quickly renewable resources we have. When pressed and heated it creates a practical, strong, inexpensive, rot resistant building material. With its thermal and sound insulating qualities it could replace wood paneling, particleboard, and drywall. Trees cut for paper take anywhere from 50 to 500 years to grow while hemp can be cultivated in 100 days and can yield four times more paper over a 20 year period of time. It is longer lasting and can be recycled up to seven times whereas wood's paper only four. Now with all the paper schools alone use, wouldn't it be more environmentally sound to promote a quickly renewable resource?* Biodegradable Plastic: Believe it or not it has been done before. In 1941 Henry Ford built a biodegradable plastic car from hemp oil and wheat straw. It works like this: Hemp stems are 80 percent hurds which are 77 percent cellulose which is the primary chemical feedstock used to make plastic. One acre of hemp can produce as much cellulose as 4.1 acres of trees.* The Legal Issue: Marijuana and industrial hemp are both derivatives of the cannabis plant, which is the only plant genus to contain a unique class of molecular compounds called cannabinoids. There are many but the two most prevalent being delta 9 Tetrahydrocannibinol or THC, the psychoactive ingredient, and cannibidol or CBD, the anti-psychoactive ingredient. Marijuana has a large amount of THC in it and not enough CBD to cancel out the effect, therefore it is illegal -- plain and simple. Yet industrial hemp contains less than 1 percent THC in it and a large amount of CBD, which in turn cancels out any miniscule effect the THC might cause. So hemp is not marijuana; in fact it could be called "anti-marijuana."Please take this information and share it with somebody. There are so many people misinformed about this subject and so many other alternatives to the energy we're using and the products we're consuming. There is always room for furthering.Sarah Perfetto lives in Napa.Source: Napa Valley Register (CA)Author: Sarah PerfettoPublished: Friday, March 15, 2002Copyright: 2002 Pulitzer Community Newspapers, Inc.Website: http://www.napanews.com/Contact: napaopinion napanews.comRelated Articles & Web Sites:FTE's Hemp Linkshttp://freedomtoexhale.com/hls.htmThe Drug Czar's View of Edible Hemphttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread12235.shtmlManufacturers of Hemp Foods Gear Up for Fight http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread12221.shtml Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #10 posted by FoM on March 17, 2002 at 08:12:22 PT mayan Have a great day! Green beer and all. Oh that doesn't sound good to me. LOL!Been looking for news but haven't found any so far but will keep looking. [ Post Comment ] Comment #9 posted by mayan on March 17, 2002 at 07:55:58 PT from, that is... I put fom instead of from & I haven't even started in on that green beer yet! Happy St. Patrick's day "FoM" & all visitors at C-News! (Now where's that green food-coloring?) [ Post Comment ] Comment #8 posted by mayan on March 17, 2002 at 07:50:57 PT hope is alive The kids will take over...they have the most to lose.I don't know who said this but I think it sums it up:We don't inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it fom our children [ Post Comment ] Comment #7 posted by The GCW on March 17, 2002 at 03:24:34 PT Kids It is said that the children are our greatest asset. They are going to be a big help in ending this prohibition. [ Post Comment ] Comment #6 posted by FoM on March 16, 2002 at 21:59:03 PT Patrick I liked that one too. We must think a like. I think they all are great. I always remembered these too: May you be in Heaven a full half hour afore the devil knows ye're dead. Don't walk in front of me. I may not follow. Don't walk behind me. I may not lead. Walk beside me And just be my friend. [ Post Comment ] Comment #5 posted by DdC on March 16, 2002 at 21:56:05 PT Putting Your Money Where Your Mouth Is! A $100,000 CHALLENGE TO THE WORLD TO PROVE US WRONGIF all fossil fuels and their derivatives, as well as trees for paper and construction, were banned in order to save the planet, reverse the Greenhouse Effect, and stop deforestation;THEN there is only one known annually renewable natural resource that is capable of providing the overall majority of the world's paper and textiles; meet all of the world's transportation, industrial and home energy needs, while simultaneously reducing pollution, rebuilding the soil, and cleaning the atmosphere all at the same time . . .And that substance is - the same one that did it all before Cannabis Hemp...Marijuana!Sponsored by: H.E.M.P., Help End Marijuana Prohibition (America), Hanf Haus (Germany), Sensi Seeds/Hash Marijuana Museum (Holland) and T.H.C., The Texas Hemp Campaign (America)The Elkhorn Manefesto http://www.wealth4freedom.com/Elkhorn.html Jack Herer.Com [ Post Comment ] Comment #4 posted by Patrick on March 16, 2002 at 21:48:17 PT FoM Thank you for the link to your Irish page! I especially enjoyed the following saying: The ability to tell a man to go to hell, so that he will look forward to making the trip.That pretty much sums up my feeling towards drug war nazis like Hutchinson and Walters and the other Cannabis prohibitionists that can't even comprehend what this 16-year-old Temescal High School student understands so well. [ Post Comment ] Comment #3 posted by MikeEEEEE on March 16, 2002 at 21:13:30 PT Oil or hemp? Cheney isn't meeting with hemp growers, that's for sure. http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/020316/168/19hgm.html Happy St. Patrick's Day everyone. [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by FoM on March 16, 2002 at 20:56:47 PT Happy St. Patrick's Day , Patrick and Everyone! I made a little page for you all. My Mom was Irish so I like this holiday but don't drink green beer! LOL!http://www.freedomtoexhale.com/irish.htm [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by Patrick on March 16, 2002 at 20:20:16 PT My ode… …to St. PatrickLet the Luck-of-the-Irish be smiling on ya when yer chasing da snakes and a running from da devil!It's green to be Irish and it's Irie to be wit da kind green Irish!My Pot O Gold Award goes not to the green cloverleaf this year but to the green sativa leaf instead. It survived yet another year of Zero Tolerance and the DEA. Thank you God.Happy St. Patrick's Day To All! [ Post Comment ] Post Comment