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Is Hemp Poised to Make Its Comeback from Legal Limbo?

I recently attended a Tiny Hemp House building workshop coordinated by John Patterson of Ft. Collins, and his assistants, Cait, Randall, Frank, and Garrett.

This three day workshop introduced us to building and finishing a tiny house featuring hemp as an aggregate ingredient in the hempcrete.  Hempcrete uses the inner woody core of the hemp stalk to make a mineral matrix, which forms a non-toxic, carbon-negative, energy-efficient building material. Hempcrete is easy to make, since it only requires the core fiber of the industrial hemp plant, a mixture of natural minerals, and water.

I own a small remote farm and the idea of growing a few hundred hemp plants and chopping them up into dried fiber to use to build my retirement home was exciting enough for me to want to retire right now and start growing.

Alas, Patterson shattered my dreams and with it brought a healthy dose of the “pig in the python” problem that represents hemp growing in America.  

Hemp is a relative of the cannabis plant that contains .3% THC or less. Folks get either confused or freaked out without having the proper understanding of the difference between the two.  Marijuana won’t  get you buzzed before about 15% THC, and most strains brag of 25% and up.  

For law enforcement, it is impossible to positively differentiate hemp from marijuana without giving the plant a “drug test.” While this government-issued limitation on THC content of .3% is entirely arbitrary and scientifically worthless, it is the standard.

The Farm Bill of 2014 provides an avenue for hemp research, and Colorado has allowed any approved hemp grower to grow under a research license. The wheels of commerce and Colorado’s forward thinking Department of Agriculture have begun a new industry with tens of thousands of potential applications.

The problem is the anticipated “pig in a python” that is certain to occur with thousands of acres of hemp under cultivation and no way to process the stalk into a usable form.

My Tiny Hemp House course took a nosedive when Patterson told the class that he imported packed hemp from Europe because there was no processing facility in the United States that turned the hemp waste product into the insulation filler necessary for a builder to utilize.

For show and effect, a large bag of U.S. derived, chopped and non-separated hemp was delivered and used sparingly in the mix. It was clear to my untrained eye that the loose fiber, dust, and crap that was included in the U.S. version would be very detrimental to any successful hemp fiber built house, tiny or otherwise.

It was also clear that this was not a cost effective method of building. The mixing of materials alone was problematic enough that no Tiny Hemp Home was going to be built on my property without someone with a hell of a lot of experience determining the proportions.

Patterson took a group of 35 of us and taught us the basics of how to fill and plaster the ceiling, walls and floor of a “tiny” home to demonstrate the versatility and overall value of hemp as an insulation, stabilization, and wall treatment. The weather was typical Colorado fall: a moment of summer followed by a moment of winter. Freezing rain, hot sun, and wind all took their turn as we mixed the solution that would fill the temporary wall forms that Patterson had constructed for this purpose.

The variety of mixtures and weather showed clearly in the layers of wall once Patterson removed the forms. Despite a huge variance of texture and density (that could be artistic if done intentionally), the resultant wall was a testament to the mixture’s versatility. It held! It was still wet and I could tell it would take weeks to completely cure. An important part of the magic of hemp as a substrate is that it never completely cures. It breathes.

If all we care about are facts, hemp makes an outstanding stabilization, insulation, and fiber material. If we also consider the domestic legal reality, there is no practical way to utilize hemp as a suitable material for building. The U.S. hemp industry suffers all the stigma of marijuana without any of the guidance. Hemp can’t get you high! So it has nowhere near the profit margins of its THC-laden ganja sister.

Everyone who is growing hemp is doing so on the promise of a new agricultural revolution. Many are taking the flowers and creating CBD oil, rumoured to cure everything from epilepsy to toenail fungus. Yet it is approved by the FDA for absolutely nothing and banned from intrastate commerce, depending on the lawyer you consult.

But a CO2 oil extraction machine is an entirely different process than a hemp fiber decorticator. It has a different market, and different processing and shipping requirements. In the U.S., once the flower is chopped from either hemp or marijuana, the stem and waste product is mulched and destroyed. (Legally, this is required in most marijuana states).

But nobody has really explored what to do with the hemp by-product which has no psychotropical effect. Horse bedding is about as creative as we have become. Millions of tons of some of the finest, most versatile fiber on earth will be dumped in landfill without the slightest regard to its potential uses. In Canada, they simply let it dry and burn it to the ground. 

This problem will be solved, but slowly. Spending tens of thousands on a decorticator for the first hemp plants grown in the U.S. in 70 years is a hard investment to sell.

When cannabis was made illegal in 1937, people stopped producing and processing hemp. All industrial knowledge was lost in the U.S.

Marijuana simply went underground and the market continued, but all hemp production was truly stopped. It was re-started briefly during wartime as the plant was used for military products, but was shut down again to keep us from both the psychotropic effects of marijuana and the the use of hemp as a paper and cotton alternative.

The market abhors a vacuum.  Some smart entrepreneurs will invest to process this amazing fiber for its many usable properties. But until then, a lot of plant matter will be wasted. Innovators like John Patterson will know something that the rest of us are just beginning to discover: there is no material on Earth quite like hemp.

Mark Goldfogel

Mark Goldfogel

Mark Goldfogel is an entrepreneur, consultant, writer, and speaker. He is credited with having first proposed “Seed to Sale Tracking” as a means of diversion control, taxation, and health and human safety to the State of Colorado. He co-founded the cannabis industry’s first compliance inventory control system and was a key advisor to The Fourth Corner Credit Union, a financial institution with a banking charter to support the “Hemp and Cannabis Movement.” He has advised States, non-industry companies wishing to enter the industry, and startup companies capitalizing on the opportunities and avoiding the potholes of the budding cannabis industries. For a free copy of his book, Smoking Something, The Cannabis Paradox10, (Amazon $24.20) please send an email to [email protected].

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