As Earth Day approaches, is growing cannabis good for the planet – it is a bit of a mixed bag

As Earth Day approaches, everyone is evaluating what is good for the planet.  Plastic, deforestation, fake fur, and Temu’s fast fashion are clearly bad for the planet, but others are more nuanced. Ever since Morton Hilbert started the movement, it has been a time reflect, reassess and hopefully adjust. With marijuana and CBD becoming mainstream and popular over the last few years, is cannabis good for the planet?

While cannabis has clear medical benefits and is considering a treat recreationally, it can take a toil on the earth. There are some benefits. As a fast-growing plant, cannabis can absorb significant amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, making it a potentially valuable crop for combating climate change. 

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The plant’s deep roots also help prevent soil erosion, and its flowers attract pollinators like bees, supporting biodiversity. Additionally, cannabis has been shown to be effective at phytoremediation – absorbing and storing heavy metals from contaminated soils, which can help clean up polluted land. These are all related to outdoor grows.

The downside can have environmental risks which need to be managed. Both indoor and outdoor cannabis grows can be highly water-intensive, with estimates of up to 6 gallons of water per plant per day for cultivation. This water usage can deplete local water resources and pollute waterways with fertilizers and pesticides.  While less than crops like citrus fruits, grapes (wine), palmists, apricots, it is still a significant impact.

Indoor grows also have a large energy footprint, with high electricity demands for lighting, HVAC, and other equipment, leading to significant greenhouse gas emissions. Cannabis farming can also contribute to deforestation and soil erosion if not done sustainably, such as by clearing land on steep slopes. And the plants themselves emit volatile organic compounds that can negatively impact local air quality.

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With the right policies and farming techniques, cannabis could potentially be grown in an environmentally-friendly way which sequesters carbon, supports biodiversity, and remediates contaminated soils. But the industry will need to prioritize sustainability to fully realize the plant’s potential as an eco-friendly crop. Biden’s climate friendly adminstatration can make a difference with legalization. Southern and other farming states with experience in outdoor growing will help. Thoughtful regulation, life cycle assessments, and adoption of precision agriculture technologies will all be important to making cannabis cultivation more sustainable.

Did James Bond make the martini famous? Or did the martini help make Bond cool?

The classic line of “shaken or stirred” has been used by men for decades.  Bond instructs the bartender in the phrase “shaken and not stirred” in Diamonds Are Forever and Dr No and it has been in our lexicon ever since. But did Bond make the martini famous – or did the martini help Bond. And what is the perfect James Bond Martini?

The history of the martini is murky, “Professor” Jerry Thomas, a famous and influential 19th century bartender, invented the drink at the Occidental Hotel in San Francisco, sometime in the late 1850s or early 1860s. As the story goes, a miner, about to set out on a journey to Martinez, California, put a gold nugget on the bar and asked Thomas to mix him up something special. Thomas produced a drink containing Old Tom (sweetened) gin, vermouth, bitters and Maraschino, and dubbed it the “Martinez” in honor of the customer’s destination.

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The big question is gin or vodka? Purist insist it be gin for the classic martini, but numbers say vodka is preferred. Vodka sales are about $7.5 billion annually while gin is around $5 billion. If you order a classic martini, you will probably be served gin unless you say vodka. Bond seems fairly fluid in his choice, he orders 19 vodka martinis and 16 gin martinis throughout Fleming’s novels and short stories.

Like Bond’s creator Ian Fleming, James Bond prefers his cocktails shaken and not stirred. A traditional martini is stirred rather than shaken, but Fleming’s biographer Andrew Lycett shared the author preferred martinis shaken since he believe it preserved the flavor.

“The perfect Martini, to me, takes advantage of the “blank canvas” nature of this timeless cocktail. “Many cocktails restrict you to specific garnishes, and even fewer allow the liberty to swap the base spirit.

With the Martini, a vodka base that’s heavy on the olives and light on the vermouth is just as “right” as one made with gin and a twist of lemon, even though they couldn’t be more different once you take your first sip. Accompanied by a bowl of olives, bleu cheese or salty potato chips to snack on, and I’ll savor this iconic cocktail in bliss.

I personally love the body, complexity and herbaceous kick of vermouth, often making it a co-star in my version”

The Khanna Martini

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 oz vodka
• 3/4 oz dry vermouth
• Ice
• Lemon zest twist

Create

• Combine vodka and vermouth in a shaker with ice.
• Shake for 10-20 seconds.
• Strain into a chilled martini glass.
• Garnish with a lemon twist, first rubbing it along the rim for a burst of citrus aroma.

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Dean Martin, Humphrey Bogart, Bette Davis’s Margo Channing, FDR, Frank Sinatra, and Jessica Walter’s Lucille Bluth are all noted martini fans. One of the most fun is the great Megan Mullally’s Karen Walker from the show Will & Grace.

The Karen Walker Martini

Ingredients

• 2.5 oz. High-end vodka
• .5 oz. Dry vermouth
• .5 oz. Olive brine

Create

• Pour all ingredients into shaker with ice cubes.
• Shake well
• Strain in chilled cocktail glass

The Perfect James Bond Martini

Ingredients

• 2 ¼ ounces dry gin
• 1 ounce dry vermouth
• 1 lemon twist, for garnish
• 1 olive (for garnish)

Create

• Combine vermouth and gin in a mixing glass filled with ice
• Fill glass with ice and stir rapidly. Continue adding ice and stirring until the additional ice has been submerged within the cocktail
• Strain the cocktail into the chilled martini glass
• Express the lemon twist over the cocktail
• Place expressed lemon twist and the skewered olive on the chilled rim