Legal cannabis is growing fast. Since November 2012, when voters in Colorado and Washington approved legalizing the plant, seven more states followed suit, and two more have legalization measures on the ballot next month. And don’t forget Canada, where marijuana became officially legal in mid-October.

All that growth brings a growing demand for energy and other resources, however. Cannabis business analytics firm New Frontier Data recently released a report showing that electricity consumption by America’s pot industry will increase by 162 percent by 2020, with the industry currently consuming 1.1 million megawatt hours of electricity annually, or enough to power 92,500 homes for a year.

A lawsuit filed by two Colorado landowners who claim that a nearby marijuana grow has reduced their property values in part because the smell makes horseback riding less pleasant goes to trial in Denver federal court today. And the repercussions of the suit’s strategy, based on federal racketeering laws, could have far-reaching effects on the cannabis industry in Colorado and beyond.

The case was filed in February 2015 by Safe Streets Alliance, a national anti-pot group, on behalf of two members, Phillis Windy Hope Reilly and Michael P. Reilly. Early on, the effort didn’t seem particularly professional: Note that the organization misspelled marijuana as “marajuana” in its initial press release on the subject. But SSA’s success in court over the past three years-plus has overcome this gaffe.

Fun fact: You can never have too much Sour Diesel. Don’t believe me? You’re about to read the word “diesel” so often that you’ll swear you were wearing a trucker hat.

I’m not saying you can never smoke too much weed — smoking is still bad, mmkay? — but if I had to puff one strain for the rest of my life, Sour Diesel would be a strong candidate. The popular sativa’s lasting, uplifting high and rubbery stank make it an easy choice for the novice and experienced alike, so naturally, the Diesel family tree has branched out to create to a number of different strains. But how many of them carry the genetics of three Diesels in one?

Colorado’s cannabis industry is still changing at a rapid pace. The industry’s watchdog, the state Marijuana Enforcement Division, updates its rules and regulations every year in hopes of catching up with the expanding field, which is growing like a weed in more ways than one.

The MED’s annual meetings aren’t unique to cannabis; plenty of regulatory agencies update their rules each year. But governing a federally illegal industry that is continually developing new methods for ingestion, packaging and product extraction takes a lot of work. That’s why the MED held six stakeholder meetings over the summer and into the fall, with public health and regulatory officials, industry members, law enforcement representatives and other individuals that make up Colorado’s legal cannabis picture.

Matthew Kind can’t do many interviews past noon. Next month, he might have to shut off even earlier, depending on which time zone he’s in. Such restrictions are usually avoided by talk-show hosts, who stick closely to standard production deadlines in order to consistently churn out content. Yet Kind’s ever-evolving itinerary is exactly why he chose this line of work.

The host of the CannaInsider Podcast and his family of four have lived in nearly a dozen countries throughout Europe and North America since 2016, thanks largely to a substance that would get him arrested at most international borders: His weekly podcast, which he hosts remotely with the help of his wife, Bethany, focuses on business and industry trends in cannabis.

When Adolphus A. Busch V, the great-great-grandson of Eberhard Adolphus Anheuser Busch, announced the launch of his Colorado-based cannabis brand on October 10, there were plenty of easy assumptions to make about big alcohol’s infiltration of legal weed. But the Colorado State University graduate says Budweiser and its parent company, Anheuser-Busch InBev, have nothing to do with his new venture, ABV Cannabis Co.

According to the Adolphus V, he started his company thanks to a “small investment” from his father, Adolphus Busch IV (the last Busch to control Anheuser-Busch), and that came after several years of grinding through the the beginning of Colorado’s recreational pot industry. Now he’s selling CO2-extracted hash pens across Colorado, with plans to expand into flower sales and jump into other states soon. To learn more about his background and plans in pot, Westword caught up with the young Busch

Once Canada began its cannabis legalization efforts, investors’ eyes shifted from the fragmented state policies in America to a federal government up north that was open for business. The money soon followed: Reports of massive investments from companies like Molson-Coors and rumors of interest from Coca-Cola continue to swirl around Canada’s new legal cannabis sector (legalization will officially begin October 17) — and Colorado brands have taken notice.

Dixie Elixirs is one of a handful prominent cannabis companies based in Colorado that has already began establishing itself in the Canadian market, but Dixie took it a step further last week when the brand announced its intentions to go public in Canada. To learn more about the financial obstacles pot companies face in America, and how they’re going north to avoid them, we talked to Dixie CEO Chuck Smith.

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