Tag Archives: CO2

Half Hill Farm partners with former tobacco farm to grow hemp

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Half Hill Farm is now partnered with a former tobacco grower to produce premium indoor grown hemp flower. The new 5,000 square feet indoor grow space at Boze Farms in Carthage, TN should be fully operational later this year.

The indoor grow will provide bulk wholesale flower to stores and manufacturers including Half Hill Farm’s Wellness Emporium retail stores across the state. The new climate controlled facility will also supply their new CO2 extraction lab in Woodbury to ensure in-house quality controls from start to finished product.

“We know retailers and consumers have a lot of options on the market,” said Half Hill Farm owner Vince Oropesa. “That’s why we’re focused on providing a premium value with quality growing and processing that can scale to meet demand.”

Many hemp farmers and processors in Tennessee rely on solvent extraction that can process mass quantities of hemp at a time using ethanol or butane. Half Hill Farm’s new extraction and testing lab will use higher quality supercritical CO2 extraction. The slower process uses a few pounds of hemp at a time and will help ensure only the best hemp is extracted producing a better quality product option for consumers and manufacturers.

“We know we can’t CO2 extract everything,” said owner Scot Smotherman who heads up the partnership. “But there’s no shortage of good quality ethanol extraction service options for larger volume grows.”

Half Hill Farm was the first USDA certified organic farm in Tennessee to grow industrial hemp. We are now a licensed hemp grower, processor and permitted food manufacturer producing quality CO2 extracted CBD hemp oil blends in 500mg, 1000mg, and 2500mg formulas and a 1000mg full spectrum CBD hemp topical salve.

More than 2,900 grower licenses were issued to Tennessee farms by the Tennessee Department of Agriculture this year. For perspective, neighboring Kentucky is the nation’s third largest grower of hemp, and they issued 1,000 grower licenses this year.

The year round indoor grow and the ability to scale into several hundred thousand square feet elsewhere on the farm was a critical component in Half Hill Farm partnering with Boze Farm.

“Farming has taken a real beating over the past few years, “ said Joe Darren Boze. “We’re hoping hemp helps turns it around.”

Jimmy Joe Boze, Joe’s father, started growing hemp when his tobacco contract was suddenly pulled. He still proudly makes pre-rolls from last year’s harvest and humbly says he did it to see how it will go. While he’s hopeful, and sees how it helps people, he’s wary and still describes this year as ‘poking around to see what works.’

“This ain’t my first rodeo,” Jimmy Joe added with a wink and hint of good old farmer’s been-there-done-that attitude. “Let’s see what the boys can do with it.”

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How hugelkultur can help heal the planet

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Hugelkultur is German for “hill culture.” It’s a composting method that allows you to grow food while longer decay processes break down large volumes of buried or mounded wood. It’s an amazing way to sequester carbon and help reduce CO2 outputs that recently have been measured at record levels along with record setting heat. It’s also something you can commit to doing right now to make a difference this Earth Day.

The problem: According to a 2010 report by the EPA, the total global emissions of carbon since the Industrial Revolution are estimated at 270 F 30 Pg (Pg = petagram = 10*15 g = 1 billion ton) due to fossil fuel combustion and 136 F 55 Pg due to changes in land use and agriculture. That’s 400 metric tons of carbon. The potential of soil organic carbon sequestration through composting is roughly 1 F 0.3 Pg C/year, or 1/3 the annual increase in atmospheric CO2 per year (which is 3.3 Pg C/year).

A backyard solution: All of that simply means composting yard wastes could reduce the annual increases in carbon output over the next 20 years by 30%. That’s not through an act of Congress or demanding corporations do anything. That’s a 30% reduction made by each of us in our own backyard. Composting yard waste simply takes all the carbon that your trees and plants sucked out of the air and puts it back in the ground (sequester) where it increases the health of soil, reduces the need for chemical fertilizers, increases water conservation and reduces CO2 emissions. When we burn yard wastes or send food wastes to landfills, we release stored carbon and converted methane into the atmosphere and become part of the problem.

How to make a hugelkultur: The process is pretty simple and a perfect way to get rid of brush, control erosion, retain water and create carbon-rich beds that will produce a lot of food. One thing we’ve added to our hugelkultur beds is old mushroom logs we hope will fruit as well.

  1. Collect carbon: this can be sticks, logs, wood chips, leaves, dried or freshly cut weeds. If you can keep a brush pile going for years, the decaying wood makes a great addition to kick-start the compost process.
  2. Dig a trench in the shape of the bed or hill you want. If you are addressing erosion, keep the trench along contours to capture or slow surface water. 2 feet is deep enough.
  3. Place a thin bed of stick in the bottom and then place your largest logs on top of that. Surround the log with more sticks and cover with wood chips and some of the dirt you dug up.
  4. Super charge your hugelkultur with mushroom logs. Myceliated mushroom logs will break down quicker while also producing edible and medicinal mushrooms. There is naturally occurring mycorrhizal fungi in healthy soil that will network itsway through your hugelkultur, but you can also introduce various fungi in a powerful way.
  5. Cover with dirt and compost if you want to immediately plant in your bed or mound. Cover with nitrogen inputs like green manure (fresh grass or weed cuttings) or animal manure if you plan to plant next season.

You will notice the bed adjust quickly after a few rains followed by a slow decay that makes the surface sink. Over time, the heavier logs will disintegrate. What’s happening is mycelium, microbes, insects and decomposition are making a rich mix of carbon and nutrients for whatever you want to plant. You can plant perennial herbs or annual fruits and vegetables for years as long as you continually amend with inputs from your property. The two beds pictured here took about 1.5 tons of carbon inputs this year alone.

How composted yard waste reduces carbon emissions

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After reading our story on the front page of our local paper this week, I thought I should post some thoughts and links to supplement the section on compost making.

Making compost can be a tough subject for anyone to write about, but it’s one of the biggest steps I believe we can take toward reducing carbon emissions and understanding the role our own trees, plants and soil play in maintaining a natural balance.

The problem: According to a 2010 report by the EPA, the total global emissions of carbon since the Industrial Revolution are estimated at 270 F 30 Pg (Pg = petagram = 10*15 g = 1 billion ton) due to fossil fuel combustion and 136 F 55 Pg due to changes in land use and agriculture. That’s 400 metric tons of carbon. The potential of soil organic carbon sequestration through composting is roughly 1 F 0.3 Pg C/year, or 1/3 the annual increase in atmospheric CO2 per year (which is 3.3 Pg C/year).

A backyard solution: All of that simply means composting yard wastes could reduce the annual increases in carbon output over the next 20 years by 30%. That’s not through an act of Congress or demanding corporations do anything. That’s a 30% reduction made by each of us in our own backyard. Composting yard waste simply takes all the carbon that your trees and plants sucked out of the air and puts it back in the ground (sequester) where it increases the health of soil, reduces the need for chemical fertilizers, increases water conservation and reduces CO2 emissions. When we burn yard wastes or send food wastes to landfills, we release stored carbon and converted methane into the atmosphere and are part of the problem.

How to compost: Compost consists of four things: carbon, nitrogen, air and water. Carbon is pretty much anything brown or dry like leaves, dry grass clippings, chipped wood, or shredded newspaper. Nitrogen is manure, green grass clippings, or compostable kitchen wastes. According to the National Organic Program rules for compost, a compost pile should reach 130 degrees for three consecutive days and be turned a couple times during the process. The carbon to nitrogen (C:N) ratio should be from 25:1 – 40:1. If you don’t have enough oxygen, methane (23 times worse than CO2) is produced. Too much nitrogen and nitrous oxide (296 times worse than CO2) is produced. These two gases are created in landfills when we send our compostable inputs there instead of composting them at home.

To make a working compost pile, you need to make several alternating layers anywhere from 1-6 inches deep of either carbon or nitrogen layers. Each layer of the pile needs to be lightly watered as you make the pile. You can increase the air intake into the pile by building it in a fenced enclosure that exposes the sides, or place PVC pipe with holes in it on the ground before building the pile to allow air to circulate into the pile. After a couple days, you should see the temperature rise. When it begins to fall days or weeks later, turn the pile. After the second turning, leave the pile to cure for a month and then use the resulting rich organic compost as mulch or soil in flower beds and gardens as an alternative to commercial fertilizers.

UPDATE 05-23-14: A study released today by the Rodale Institute shows organic farm practices could overcompensate human carbon output through many required methods of sequestering carbon. Read the report here. Below is an excerpt from a Wall Street Journal post.

Citing 75 studies from peer-reviewed journals, including its own 33-year Farm Systems Trial, Rodale Institute concluded that if all cropland were converted to the regenerative model it would sequester 40% of annual CO2 emissions; changing global pastures to that model would add another 71%, effectively overcompensating for the world’s yearly carbon dioxide emissions.