The Benefits of Hemp

So lately, the world—yes, the world—is all about legalizing weed, which I am totally OK with. The thing is...everyone is so hung up on the medical side of this, which, in itself, is good. What about all the benefits of hemp, though? These benefits are things we should also be looking into for an example, and I will delve deeper into some others, but an example would be creating a combustible fuel using hemp. What? Don't you think that's possible? I think some research should be done on your half, because this is completely possible. Just look up Henry Ford's all hemp car that ran on hemp fuel and was completely made up of hemp made steel, which is stronger than our normal steel.

Let us first focus on the lumber industry. As everyone knows, trees are one of our main sources of clearing our air of CO2 and giving us life-sustaining oxygen. Yet year after year, we cut down millions of trees to build our houses, make our paper, along with many other uses. Now trees can take anywhere from twenty to fifty years to reach an acceptable size to replace the one that was cut down. That's a long time to wait to gain back one tree. Now a ton of hemp equals to about 1.63 tons of carbon absorbed per growth cycle each cycle, taking roughly 4-6 months to grow. This in comparison to a tree that in forty years absorbs one ton of CO2. Right here we have a major difference with hemp in a one year span absorbing over twice as much CO2 as a tree does in forty years. With this in mind, hemp can also make pretty much anything a tree can, from building materials (hemp bricks) to paper and mulch. Already we see a much better solution to cutting down our forests and messing with the delicate ecosystem of the world.

Let's move on to petroleum products and see where this leaves us. Perhaps it won't work for gases and plastics...wrong. Let's start with gas (to put it blatantly, this will include gas and biodiesel made from hemp seeds). First and foremost, it burns cleaner with no sulfur and an 11 percent oxygen rating, and is the first alternative fuel method to clear the EPA tier one health effects testing under section 211(b) of the clean air act. These fuels have a way higher flash point than our normal gas today, with a flash point of 300 degrees Fahrenheit compared to our diesel/gas now with a flash point of 125 degrees Fahrenheit, which means a way less chance of it all going up in smoke. To top off these great facts, it is also biodegradable, which means toxic gas and oil spills of today would be a worry of the past, as any spills would simply be absorbed and broken down naturally and quickly.

Now, for plastics—yes I was going to mention them in the last paragraph, but there are just way too many benefits of hemp gas/biodiesel that it deserved its own paragraph. So yes, hemp can make plastics. Simple knowledge, really, when you know they can make the substance that plastic is made of. Anyway, the plastics that hemp makes are actually one hundred percent biodegradable (this doesn't mean litter everywhere). So picture the number of water bottles thrown into the trash and on the ground these days. It's a huge number. In fact, more than enough to wrap around the world 190 times in one year just by the USA. These bottles are devastating to the environment and the animal life, so why not make a biodegradable water bottle? Make it so even if they are thrown on the ground, they deteriorate and disappear. Well, hemp is the answer to that as well. We could, quite literally, save the planet with one plant. ONE. Yet the government has made a point to outlaw such things (well, they outlawed collecting rainwater, so).

So why is it illegal to do this? Why can't we save the planet with the help of hemp? Well, take a look at the two industries that I have mentioned (I left out textiles to save time). These two industries are some of the biggest in the world and make the owners lots of money. This, in turn, makes the government a lot of money. If we were to shut down these industries, the already ridiculously rich people out there wouldn't make any money (OH NO), so in order to stop this from happening, what do they do? They outlaw hemp—the one item on Earth that could replace these industries, because let's face it, the government and heads of industry are not there to save us, they are there to make money. Why do you think it is now illegal to live off the grid? Because they can't make money off you. This is the way the world works, as we are brainwashed to believe we need them. In closing, the government is small and we as the people greatly outnumber them. If we truly want to save the world, to stop the destruction of the forests, then we need to stand up for what is right. We are on the verge of marijuana being legalized for medical use all over the world. It's now time to push for hemp to be our main industry and look out for the planet and not just ourselves. To anyone that reads this and agrees: You are not alone. We just need to stand up.