Cannabis is big business. More and more states are passing medical use laws and the recreation-al cannabis market will not be far behind. Medical use is mainly targeted 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-artwork methods have led to new forms of cannabis extracts reminiscent of 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 those methods.
Alcohol extraction uses ethanol and could be performed cold, scorching, or at room temperature. It stays one of the vital efficient extraction methods. Nevertheless, the hot ethanol usually extracts undesirable chlorophyll and plant waxes and requires clarification or correction steps. The cold process reduces these contaminants on the value of longer extraction times. Room temperature ethanol extraction splits these differences.
Hydrocarbon extraction makes use of butane or propane, solvents with much lower boiling points than ethanol. These solvents extract more of the plant terpenes, which provide more flavor and aroma and are subsequently better for vape oils or oral tinctures. However, like the alcohol methodology, scaling as much as giant batches is difficult and presents significant safety hazards.
CO2 extraction necessitates costly, high tech specialised pressure and temperature management equipment to deal with turning gaseous CO2 right into a supercritical fluid or cryogen. The liquid CO2, with careful control, simply extracts oils and waxes and in some makes use of requires little to no publish-processing. The CO2 extraction process is highly tunable, permitting different pressures and temperatures to extract unique botanical compounds.
Safety considerations
Following the discussion above, it is apparent that of the three most important extraction strategies contain use of extremely flammable solvents. The third includes using a cryogen with its own particular safety concerns. Subsequently, cannabis extraction, particularly at production scale, entails some significant safety issues.
First, identify all hazards. This begins by building a chemical inventory or list of chemicals with related important information comparable to material owner, date acquired, amount on hand, storage location, and accompanying safety data sheet (SDS).
SDSs are the second critical component and comprise 16 specific sections detailing information on the chemical’s constituents, physical properties, health hazards, first aid measures, personal protective equipment, and special handling and disposal requirements.2 The SDS comprises all the information wanted to develop your HCP and is critical if an exposure or incident occurs. Ensure access to the SDS is available within a few minutes always (e.g. 24/7).
Train employees
After identifying hazards and building inventory of hazardous chemical compounds, conduct the communication part of the program. This means getting the critical information to workers (e.g. training our workers on the hazards of every chemical).
In addition to the hazards, employees ought to obtain training on the potential exposure routes, signs, and symptoms of exposure and chemical warning properties (or lack thereof). Training should also embrace any personal protective equipment crucial for utilizing the chemical as well as incident response, mitigation steps, and first aid measures.
Preventive and proactive health and safety is crucial—this means the timing of training matters. All workers should obtain training prior to beginning any work with hazardous chemicals. Annual refresher training is highly recommended. Conduct a radical evaluation and re-training after any shut-call or incident.
Consider exposures
Industrial hygienists are trained to anticipate, recognize, evaluate, and management all potential health and safety hazards in the workplace. Knowing that many chemical solvents pose significant risk for publicity and health penalties, we must admit that exposure assessments are necessary.
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