Letters to the Editor: Cannabis vapes are getting special treatment in California bill
Los Angeles Times
Wed, Sep 2
Key Points
- California is close to banning disposable vape pens through Assembly Bill 762, which aims to stop the manufacture and sale of single-use, battery-embedded nicotine vape devices.
- The bill exempts cannabis vape devices due to industry lobbying, despite similar environmental concerns related to hardware like lithium batteries and heavy metals.
- The exemption for cannabis vapes is likely motivated by the state's desire to preserve tax revenue from the growing legal cannabis market, which accounts for 12% of licensed vape sales.
- The environmental issues cited focus on the physical hazards of disposable vapes, such as beach litter and recycling-plant fires, not the vaping liquid itself.
To the editor: California seems close to banning disposable vape pens (“California moves to outlaw disposable vapes, a toxic trash plague from beaches to battery fires,” Aug. 27). Good! Assembly Bill 762, now on the governor’s desk, would stop the manufacture and sale of single-use, battery-embedded nicotine vape devices. Cannabis devices, however, were written out of this bill after industry lobbying. The environmental problem the bill’s authors cite is the hardware, i.e. lithium batteries, heavy metals, beach litter, recycling-plant fires — not the flavor of the liquid. The exemption was not written because cannabis vapes are safer. It was most likely written because the cannabis industry argued that it makes up 12% of licensed vape sales and that’s a tax stream the state does not want to lose. California has spent a decade building a legal cannabis economy and collecting the revenue that comes with it. That is not environmental policy. “It’s all about the money!” Trent Sanders, La Cañada Flintridge