Facts About Industrial Hemp

Hemp does not only produce CBD oils, but it can also be utilised for all of the following.

1. Clothing

Industrial hemp has been used for making textiles for thousands of years; samples of hemp fabric in China date back to 8,000 BC–though it has certainly had a renaissance of late.

Shedding the slightly rough and tough image it once had hemp has broken into the realms of high fashion, has been mixed with silk for lingerie, as well as being applied to more obvious applications where it’s durability is used to best advantage: Providing material for shoes, jeans, and other tough sports clothing.

Major companies are finally participating in the growing hemp clothing industry.

2. Paper

Industrial hemp has been used for paper for at least 2,000 years, even though today hemp paper accounts for about only 0.05% of world paper production. Even though hemp is a far more quickly renewable and sustainable source of pulp for paper, because of the small number and relatively old age of processing equipment for hemp paper, help pulp ends up being several times more expensive than wood pulp.

*Using Industrial hemp could reduce deforestation by half. Hemp is 85% cellulose, which means no chlorine or dioxins are needed to separate the cellulose. Trees have only 30% and require much chemical input to process into the paper.

3. Fuel

Yes, you can make biofuel from hemp. Like pretty much any vegetable oil you can take industrial hemp oil and process it into biodiesel. You still have all the concerns about the conversion of land that could be used for food production into land used to fuel vehicles, but the biodiesel process is certainly solid.

As cellulose ethanol technology becomes more commercial viable–something seemingly just over the horizon for a couple of years now–it stands to reason that hemp could also be utilized to make liquid fuels that are chemically identical to petroleum-based gasoline or diesel as well.

Industrial hemp produces 10 tons of biomass in four months, 4 times the production of corn, which makes it the only legitimate cost-competitive energy crop for charcoal, ethanol, etc.

4. Food & Beverages

About one-third of hemp seed’s weight comes from hemp oil, which is both edible but highly nutritious, containing essential fatty acids. The whole seed is about 25% protein and is a  good source of calcium and iron, as well as having more omega-3 than walnuts–all of which point to hemp’s potential for food and as a dietary supplement. But hemp also can be put to good use in iced tea and brewed into beer, fermented into wine, and distilled into other alcoholic beverages. Oh, and there’s hemp milk too.

Industrial hemp requires no herbicides, pesticides, fungicides or insecticides to grow well.

5. Building Supplies

Hemp provides all sorts of good building materials. You can make it into insulation and fibre-boards and even be used to make hempcrete, a stronger, lighter, and more environmentally friendly version of concrete.

6. Plastics

Ford famously produced a prototype car made out of hemp & soy plastic in the early 1940s. Though it never went into production, with undue influence from chemical giants. More recently hemp has been made into shower curtain liners, CD & DVD cases, and all sorts of other plastic-like products and virtually all European car makers have begun using Industrial hemp-based composites for panels and linings etc. Let’s stop plastic!

7. Chemical Cleanup

One of the most intriguing uses for hemp is in cleaning up soil contamination. In the late 1990s, industrial hemp was tested at the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Ukraine to help heal the soil. Because of its fast rate of growth each season, up to 250-400 plants per square meter, each up to 15 feet tall, hemp shows goof potential in cleaning up land contaminated with fly ash, sewage sludge, or other heavy metals–though hemp’s use in phytoremediation on any scale is in its infancy.

8. Bodycare

Hemp oil’s superior EFA content helps rebuild skin cell membranes, and softens them *The Body Shop sold an estimated $40 million worth of hemp-based products last year, and Granjacia has a new line of hemp-based cosmetics available Europe wide.