Why leading California cannabis growers should welcome switch to LED lighting

The world is going green and we must lead with innovation.

In an effort to curb swelling energy consumption in the nation’s most populous state, the California Energy Commission (CEC) has proposed that all indoor cannabis operations convert entirely to LED lights by 2023.

Medical marijuana is legal in California and 34 other states, while recreational use is now legal in 15 states with more expected to legalize. Growth within California and other states has fueled demand for cannabis flower, resulting in the rapid expansion of both the number of indoor grows and the total square footage required to meet demand.

The highest quality cannabis is produced indoors. The irrigation, ventilation and lighting required to nurture and grow plants drives enormous energy consumption. The CEC aims to address this through a number of new regulations — most notably by requiring companies to convert lower efficiency grow lights, such as metal halide or high-pressure sodium, to more energy-efficient LEDs. This would, however, require a substantial upfront investment by cannabis cultivators.

LED lights use only a fraction of the energy of other sources, decreasing power costs. They also last substantially longer, generating saving in maintenance and replacement costs. LED is environmentally friendly and provides cannabis growers a viable way to meaningfully contribute to the campaign against climate change.

The cannabis industry is against this proposal — a shift of this magnitude will require cultivators to absorb substantial upfront costs and invest in research to develop new cultivation methods to ensure that flower production can be maintained without forsaking quality. Some critics argue the cost of conversion will drive out new operators, encourage illegal grows and entice cultivators to work outside the scrutiny of regulators.

We are sympathetic to our peers who are pushing back against the CEC. Energy consulting firm Seinergy estimated that the move to LED could cost existing California growers $255 million. Seinergy likened the potential expense hike to requiring all Californians to switch to electric cars within a couple years — a timeline that no state, including California, is considering.

In our view, the backlash against LED is shortsighted. The goal of this regulation is to slow climate change and fuel our future economy. While marijuana grown under existing high-pressure sodium lights is the world’s best, we are convinced that, through a rigorous experimentation process, we can cultivate equivalent production at the same high quality.

Nobody has all the answers, but in our LED growing trials, we are well on our way to defining the methods and formulas for growing high-quality products while reducing electrical load. We are also testing methods such as “stacking” — layering grow areas atop each other, allowing for more LED lights per building and making every square foot of real estate more productive and profitable — which has proven successful in other areas of agriculture.

We are not running from a problem. Instead, we are developing solutions and seeking to lead. We believe that companies such as ours that embrace this inevitable change will be well-positioned to grow market share more profitably and quickly in California — the world’s largest cannabis market — and adapt seamlessly to other environmental changes likely to be imposed as the legal marijuana market expands nationwide.

Kings Garden expects to have the ability to begin transitioning to LED in 2021, installing the first lights before the end of the year. We have targeted a full transition before the close of 2022, ahead of the CEC’s planned deadline of January 2023 to start the process.

We fully expect to make the transition profitable by developing techniques to continue producing premium products.