Hemp is a carbon-absorbing plant that we can use to lock carbon in the materials.
By Joshua Haiar, South Dakota Searchlight
Ken Meyer walks into South Dakota’s industrial hemp processing plant and his boots leave a fine dust layer on the floor.
It’s loud. It’s loud. The haze is cut by strips of sunlight.
On one wall, piles of hemp stalks are stacked. Meyer points to a forklift that is feeding one of these piles into a machine.
The fibers come out on one side. Another side of the machine, pieces of “hurd”, or woody core are thrown into a large bag atop pallet. Meyer raises one handful.
He added, “We are able to turn hemp stalks in animal bedding material, hempcrete and bioplastics. Right here in South Dakota.”
Meyer has a clear vision. Meyer has a vision.
Meyer explained that hemp absorbs carbon during its growth, and the carbon can be locked into various products. Meyer said, “All of that production could take place here in South Dakota.”
Complete Hemp Processing, Meyer’s company, cannot manage the infrastructure, investments, market development, and oversight required to achieve this vision.
John Peterson, with Dakota Hemp in Wakonda is building the second hemp processing plant for the state and is also a farmer.
Peterson explained that “we can’t have everyone start to plant hemp.” “You need the whole chain—growers, processors, and manufacturers—to come online at the same time. “And that’s difficult.”
Hemp and Carbon
South Dakotans are only growing hemp since the year 2021. In 2024, 3,700 acres of hemp will be harvested by the state. It is the nation’s number one producer. In order to capitalize on the potential of hemp in sequestering CO2 and keeping it from trapping temperature in the atmosphere millions more acres will be needed.
Hemp can reach 16-feet in just three months. Photosynthesis is required to grow a 16-foot field. This process involves plants absorbing carbon dioxide, water and sunlight in order to produce energy. Brittany McKell of Hemp Carbon Standard, Canada, said that an acre of stalks of hemp absorbs about 5.5 tons per acre every season. Brittany McKell, with Hemp Carbon Standard in Canada, said that an extra ton CO2 is stored per acre if less-invasive tillage techniques are used.
Hemp Carbon Standard helps farmers quantify how much carbon is sequestered in their hemp farms and then converts that into credits. The credits are bought by companies or individuals to offset greenhouse gas emissions. Those profits are shared by the company with its farmers. Peterson has recently earned 367 Carbon Credits on a single year’s harvest. The credits can be sold at more than $100.
The majority of the carbon dioxide is released through decay and digestion.
Decomposition occurs in harvested hemp as well. The only way to keep carbon from the hemp stalks is by processing them into materials that last a long time. Hemp can be used for everything, from bioplastics to lumber and textiles to insulation. Hempcrete for instance is a building material that’s made out of lime and hemp hurd. This absorbs carbon dioxide as it sets.
Hemp Carbon Standard encourages use of these products as well, McKell says, since they are sustainable and less carbon intensive alternatives to their carbon-intensive counterparts. These include wood, oil-based materials, and construction materials that require energy. McKell stated that, depending on the products being produced, hemp-based alternatives are less carbon-intensive and prevent 9-18 tons of CO2 entering the air per acre.
The numbers mean that if 18 percent of South Dakota’s approximately 18.5 million cropland acres grew hemp every summer, the hemp stalks—not counting the carbon potentially stored in the soil or the material offset of producing less carbon-intensive materials—would remove over 18 million tons of atmospheric carbon per year. Summit Carbon Solution’s Carbon Sequestration Pipeline, a project in South Dakota that aims for a similar goal: capturing up to 18,000,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions each year from 57 ethanol factories in five different states. It has also faced a number of legal and regulatory hurdles. Landowners have refused access to the project and expressed concern about toxic carbon dioxide emissions.
Landowners whose land is crossed by a pipeline will receive payments for easements. Carbon credits can be sold by farmers to maximize the storage potential of their hemp crop. Other row crops like corn or soybeans require the use of herbicides. Hemp does not.
Hemp faces challenges in the regulatory arena despite its great potential. Industrial hemp supporters say it was no easy feat to get hemp so far.
Legalizing hemp is an important issue
Although hemp was federally legalized under the 2018 Farm Bill—which defined hemp as cannabis containing no more than 0.3 percent tetrahydrocannabinol (known as THC, which results in a high at greater concentrations)—South Dakota did not immediately follow suit.
Early attempts to legalize the production of hemp at state-level were met by resistance, especially from former Governor. Kristi Noem (R)’s administration expressed concerns that hemp legalization could lead to wider marijuana legalization. Oren lesmeister, a Democratic ex-lawmaker from Parade and a Rancher, has spent years fighting for the hemp industry in South Dakota.
Lesmeister explained that there was fear of everyone running out to get stoned. It took education and perseverance to overcome that false belief.
The regulatory and legal barriers were eliminated in phases. South Dakota first had to ensure that its laws were aligned with those of the federal government, which allowed them to legalize the crop.
South Dakota lags behind in its implementation. Hemp cultivation will begin in 2021, after the state’s administrative rules are finalized. In spite of this, there were still regulatory requirements. Meyer, however, said that South Dakota has since loosened many of its initial restrictions as it gained experience growing the crop.
Meyer stated that the THC test requirements, and background criminal checks are still major obstacles. He hopes these requirements are relaxed by the next Farm Bill.
Selling bottom-up a vision
Lesmeister draws parallels between corn-based bioethanol and the booming industry that grew with federal assistance. The Renewable Fuel Standard created a market that was guaranteed. Refiners are required to mix billions of gallons ethanol in gasoline every year, or purchase credits. South Dakota’s corn acres increased from 4,000,000 to 6,000,000 in the year before the Renewable Fuel Standard was implemented.
Lesmeister stated that hemp had made it this far with or without the help of any such thing. “But just imagine what it could achieve with some help.”
Doug Sombke of South Dakota Farmers Union believes helping the growing hemp industry is a better option to sequestering carbon than controversial proposals that would capture the carbon released by ethanol plant.
Sombke stated, “If you want to really support climate change and agriculture then get the money to those who are working on the land.”
Bryan Jorgensen from Ideal is a regenerative farm and expert in soil health. He does not believe that government intervention is necessary to combat climate change. Jorgensen sees industrial hemp, however, as an opportunity to help rural communities rebuild as part of America’s manufacturing base.
This could lead to local manufacturing, he added. It takes vision to support producers rather than extractive industries.
In comparison, he views carbon pipelines as a continuation of an agricultural economy that is overly reliant on soybeans and corn, in part due to the federal subsidy for these crops.
Jorgensen stated, “We have created this monster.” We’ve spent billions on learning to grow corn. Now we have no idea what to do. “Farmers are stuck with a system in which they don’t benefit.”
Silvia Secchi agrees. She is an agricultural and climate policy professor at the University of Iowa.
“We did not subsidise the farmer, but the corn,” said she. She said, “That is the problem.”
For the moment, South Dakota’s few thousand acres are dwarfed by 6 million acres corn and 5 millions acres soybeans. However, advocates think that this situation could rapidly change if manufacturers and hemp processors moved in and the U.S. federal government backed the vision.
Karll Lecher said, “There is a great opportunity for us here.” We just need to get more people on the ground.
South Dakota Searchlight was the first to publish this article.