As governments across the United States and around the world relax their laws against the possession and use of marijuana, a whole new crop of problems related to weed are sprouting up.
Take, for example, the smell of marijuana: Not only are some people offended by the odour of marijuana smoke, but industrial-scale growing operations also perfume the air with the sweet — or skunky, depending on your point-of-view — scent of marijuana plants.
That's become an issue in places like Colorado, which not only legalized recreational use of marijuana last year, but this month passed a state-wide measure to tax marijuana sales. To combat the rising tide of complaints about the smell of pot, officials are turning to a high-tech weapon: the Nasal Ranger. Looking like a narrow bullhorn, the Nasal Ranger — sometimes called a "nose telescope" for its ability to suss out odours — works by pressing the narrow end up to the user's nose. The interior is coated with Teflon to resist residual odour build-up. When the user inhales, air enters the device through carbon filters at increasing degrees when a dial is turned up at the wide end.
When the user detects a stench, the numerical reading on the dial is noted. In Denver, a violation occurs when the offending odour is at a 7:1 ratio, i.e..., when one unit of odour is detectable per every seven units of air in the Nasal Ranger.
The Nasal Ranger has been used to investigate odour complaints against landfills, manufacturing plants and oil refineries. Users must first pass an odour sensitivity test, which uses "sniffin' sticks" — small pens that contain different concentrations of odours — to make sure a prospective Nasal Ranger user has a sufficiently sensitive sniffer.
"I had an old guy call, complaining about this unusual odour whenever he drove past Mississippi [Avenue] and Santa Fe [Drive]," Siller told the Post. "I knew right away what it was, and told him that it was marijuana. His reaction was, 'What?'"
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