Whether you’re enjoying an edible, an oil, a capsule, or a dab, you are actually consuming a cannabis extract. The ability to infuse cannabis extracts into many kinds of other products makes them super convenient to work with, and a common ingredient in many products, including ours.
Depending on the kind of extract you are trying to produce, there are likely several different ways to make it. Some methods use chemicals or solvents, and others are solvent-free. Why does the process used matter? Because a solvent-based process can affect the quality of the final product when it comes to purity, cleanliness, and safety.
As part of our mission to help people through all-natural healing, we want to empower our customers to make the best choices possible when it comes to the wellness products they use. That’s why we’d like to take a few minutes to talk to you about cannabis extraction and how it can impact the quality of your products.
Solvent-based Extraction vs Solventless Extraction
All cannabis extraction methods can basically be broken down into two groups: solvent-based extraction techniques and solventless extraction techniques.
Solvent-based extraction techniques use solvents such as butane to strip the good stuff from cannabis plant material. A solvent chemically strips trichomes and valuable cannabinoids and terpenes from the bud into a single mixture. Afterward, a heating process purges the solvent chemicals from the mixture, leaving behind chemical-free cannabis extracts.
By comparison, solventless extraction techniques result in a similar final product, but without the use of any chemicals or solvents. We can look at rosin for one example of a solventless process. Made by placing cannabis buds or hashish into a rosin press (a machine similar to a hydraulic press), the press uses only pressure and heat to literally squeeze the extract out of the plant material. Because solventless extraction techniques do not use any solvents or chemicals, the final products are chemical-free cannabis extracts.
Why Does it Matter How Cannabis is Extracted?
Why does any of this matter? Because for us safety is a paramount consideration when it comes to cannabis use. We want to arm our customers with the knowledge necessary to make the best choices they can when it comes to the products each person chooses to put in their body.
For people who care about the cleanliness and purity of their cannabis, chemical-free cannabis extracts made through solventless oil extraction processes are clearly a better choice than products that may contain trace amounts of potentially harmful chemicals.
In theory, the purging process used in solvent-based extraction methods should produce a chemical-free final product. However, in reality, the purging process presents another opportunity for human error. Traces of solvents can still remain if a solvent-based extract is not purged correctly or for a long enough period of time.
As a result, many people prefer extracts made through solventless extraction methods since no extraction chemicals will be present. Due to the federal status of cannabis, very little cannabis research exists on this topic. Thus, no clear consensus exists on the safety of ingesting even trace amounts of solvents. To bring you the best products possible, we prefer to err on the side of caution and avoid these additives altogether.
Lab Results
At the end of the day, whether you use a solvent-based or a solventless extraction process, cleanliness and purity are the goal. Regardless of the cannabis oil extraction process, the best way to ensure that an extract is clean and safe for ingestion is through lab testing.
At Papa & Barkley, we stand behind the quality of our products. That’s why we’re always willing to provide our customers with a copy of our lab testing results. Find our analysis on any of our products via our certificate of analysis page. If, by chance, you don’t see the certificate you’re looking for listed, just send a message to our customer service department and we’ll be sure to help you out.
Clean Cannabis Extracts
At P&B, we make all products using our proprietary whole-plant solventless infusion process. We avoid the need for solvent-based extraction by simply soaking our sun-grown cannabis flowers in an oil base. This allows us to skip the use of harsh extraction processes and provide our customers with some of the cleanest plant-based medicine possible. Even better, the extracts that we make are full-spectrum—meaning that you get the full plant profile, and not just a fraction of it (like with some other types of extracts).
Clean extracts mean clean products. If you’re looking to get your hands on clean cannabis products with verified purity, check out our shop right now for a wide selection of premium CBD products including capsules, oils/tinctures, topicals, and more. Have a question about our process or about or products? Don’t hesitate to reach out, we’re always happy to chat with our customers!
