Washington’s Weed Industry Has a Million-Pound Waste Problem

Lester Black | Jul 26, 2017

People often summarize our state’s experiment with legal weed by citing the amount of money spent by consumers ($2 billion) or the amount of cannabis tax collected ($400 million). But there’s a third number that is equally impressive: 1.7 million pounds.

That’s the amount of plant waste created by Washington State’s legal marijuana industry since pot farms were first licensed in 2014, and that waste has a dirty secret. While the tax man and the pot dealer are getting their cash, most of the compostable waste created by the industry is being dumped in landfills.

Washington’s Weed Industry Has a Million-Pound Waste Problem