Cannabis is big business. More and more states are passing medical use laws and the recreation-al cannabis market is just not far behind. Medical use is principally centered on cannabidiol (CBD) extracts while extracts of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) have led the recreational market’s development of everything from oils for vaping to edible candy.
The key to all products, nevertheless, is the extraction stage. Use of advanced chemical methods and high-tech industrial machinery has allowed cannabis producers to experiment with new approaches. These state-of-the-art methods have led to new forms of cannabis extracts comparable to vape oils, oral tinctures, crumbles, and wax concentrates.
The three most used extraction techniques by the cannabis trade are alcohol extraction, hydrocarbon extraction, and supercritical carbon dioxide (CO2) extraction. As with most things in life, there are pros and cons for every of these methods.
Alcohol extraction makes use of ethanol and will be performed cold, hot, or at room temperature. It remains one of the most efficient extraction methods. However, the recent ethanol typically extracts undesirable chlorophyll and plant waxes and requires clarification or correction steps. The cold process reduces these contaminants at the value of longer extraction times. Room temperature ethanol extraction splits these differences.
Hydrocarbon extraction makes use of butane or propane, solvents with much decrease boiling factors than ethanol. These solvents extract more of the plant terpenes, which provide more taste and aroma and are therefore higher for vape oils or oral tinctures. Nonetheless, like the alcohol technique, scaling up to massive batches is troublesome and presents significant safety hazards.
CO2 extraction necessitates expensive, high tech specialized pressure and temperature management equipment to handle turning gaseous CO2 right into a supercritical fluid or cryogen. The liquid CO2, with careful control, simply extracts oils and waxes and in some uses requires little to no publish-processing. The CO2 extraction process is highly tunable, allowing completely different pressures and temperatures to extract unique botanical compounds.
Safety considerations
Following the discussion above, it is apparent that of the three major extraction methods involve use of extremely flammable solvents. The third entails using a cryogen with its own specific safety concerns. Subsequently, cannabis extraction, particularly at production scale, entails some significant safety issues.
First, determine all hazards. This begins by building a chemical inventory or list of chemicals with associated important information reminiscent of material owner, date acquired, quantity on hand, storage location, and accompanying safety data sheet (SDS).
SDSs are the second critical part and include sixteen particular sections detailing information on the chemical’s constituents, physical properties, health hazards, first aid measures, personal protective equipment, and particular dealing with and disposal requirements.2 The SDS contains all the information needed to develop your HCP and is critical if an exposure or incident occurs. Ensure access to the SDS is available within a few minutes at all times (e.g. 24/7).
Train employees
After figuring out hazards and building stock of hazardous chemical compounds, conduct the communication part of the program. This means getting the critical information to employees (e.g. training our workers on the hazards of every chemical).
In addition to the hazards, employees should receive training on the potential exposure routes, signs, and symptoms of exposure and chemical warning properties (or lack thereof). Training also needs to embody any personal protective equipment essential for using the chemical as well as incident response, mitigation steps, and first aid measures.
Preventive and proactive health and safety is essential—this means the timing of training matters. All employees should obtain training prior to beginning any work with hazardous chemicals. Annual refresher training is highly recommended. Conduct a radical assessment and re-training after any close-call or incident.
Consider exposures
Industrial hygienists are trained to anticipate, acknowledge, evaluate, and control all potential health and safety hazards in the workplace. Knowing that many chemical solvents pose significant risk for exposure and health penalties, we should admit that publicity assessments are necessary.
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