Vermont law currently caps THC for cannabis flower and concentrates but that could soon change under a new bill packed with amendments to improve the state’s cannabis market.

The Vermont Cannabis Control Board is asking lawmakers to drop the caps on the potency of cannabis and concentrates from state law, while the edibles caps would remain. Lawmakers argue that the bill could keep more consumers in the legal market, while some medical leaders in the state disagree.

Dropping the THC caps is one of several proposed changes to the state’s cannabis policies included in the new bill H.612, which the House Government Operations Committee took up on the floor for the first time on Jan. 12.

The bill targets hemp-derived products that are vaguely marketing intoxicating effects from synthetic cannabinoids such as delta-8 THC and so on. It would codify rules the board adopted last year, limiting the sale of intoxicating hemp-derived products in the state and regulate them as cannabis products if they contain more than 0.3% of total THC. The bill would codify rules the board already adopted last year that limit the sale of some  intoxicating hemp-derived products and regulate them as cannabis products if they contain more than 0.3% THC.

Current state law caps the THC percentage in smokable cannabis flower products at 30%—which is high but exceeded in certain varieties—and the amount of THC in solid or liquid concentrated cannabis at 60%. Vermont also imposes a 5 mg serving size/dose cap on edibles and 100 mg cap on entire packaged edibles. The edible dosages align with what you’d see in most other states.

“This section proposes to eliminate the first two,” Cannabis Control Board Chairman James Pepper said at the committee meeting. “The CCB has been asked in two subsequent years to evaluate the efficacy of these caps and submit reports about them.”

The problem is this leaves out potent cannabis forms that are needed by people with serious conditions like cancer or other conditions that require high amounts of THC. Valley News reports that the bill would remove those caps and also include “a laundry list of the commission’s requests.”

The bill was introduced by Reps. Michael McCarthy (D – Franklin-3) and Matt Birong (D – Addison-3) on Jan. 3.

Regulated Concentrates Safer Than the Black Market

Some people at the committee meeting argued that potency caps on concentrates only forces manufacturers to use potentially harmful fillers. You can’t just smoke anything, when it comes to vape thickeners and ingredients. 

“By limiting potency to 60%, you’re creating a perverse effect of giving the black market a monopoly on a product,” Dave Silberman, co-owner of FLORA Cannabis in Middlebury, said. “It’s a niche product—it’s maybe 4% or 5% of the entire market—but you’re giving them a monopoly on it.”

Regulated markets are more likely to vet products for harmful additives by requiring lab results and so on. If people are going to the black market to get concentrates over 60%—which are many—they’re going to have a higher risk of smoking an unapproved thickener or additive.

High Times has reported on potentially dangerous fillers such as vitamin E acetate, which is not safe to vape, and others, however it’s important to note that dangerous fillers have been used by the media to fan fear about cannabis.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed in 2019 that the additive vitamin E acetate is the likely cause of the nation’s rash of lung injuries caused by vaping. Dr. Anne Schuchat, the principal deputy director of the CDC, told reporters that the additive, which received early attention as a potential cause of e-cigarette or vaping product use–associated lung injury (EVALI), was found in the lung tissue of patients by investigators.

Others have speculated that some hemp-derived compounds have similar traits. Published in the Journal of Medical Toxicology on Dec. 12, 2022, a team of researchers led by Neal L. Benowitz discovered a link between THC-O acetate and significant danger to the lungs. THC-O acetate shares structural similarities with vitamin-E acetate—an additive that becomes dangerous to the lungs when converted by heat.

The bill would also reduce operating fees the state imposed on medical cannabis dispensaries, reducing an application fee from $2,500 to $1,000 and dropping the annual renewal fee from $25,000 down to $5,000.

It would also increase the timeframe of a medical cannabis card from three years to five years for people who consume cannabis for a chronic condition other than pain.

Last October, WCAX in Vermont profiled various school officials to probe what their plans are and how the conversation around cannabis will continue, now that sales are legal for adults.

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As American hemp farmers struggle to accurately sex plants and prevent their crops from going hot—going over the potency definition of what makes the plants hemp or 0.3% THC on a dry-weight basis—technology is improving to make these tasks a little easier. With the help of some of the top minds at Texas A&M University, Louisiana-based Mariposa Technology has created a digital farming tool for hemp and marijuana farmers using a database and software that allows them to test their crops at any stage of the growing season without having to cut any samples. Using a small laser-operated spectroscopy tool, THC content and plant gender can be determined without waiting for a lab to process the data.

The Mariposa Technology team developed Predictive Analytical Modeling Application for Plants (PAMAP), a protocol for rapid, in-field testing of live plants. It gives farmers the power to self-test, saving them weeks of valuable time that would normally be taken up by mailing cut samples for lab testing.

“The only plants that we have in our database, as of today, are cannabis plants, primarily hemp; however, the technology can be used for other plants in the future,” says Mariposa Technology Chief Operating Officer Michael Dalle Molle. “We are focusing on hemp primarily because we see major pain points in the industry that our technology can solve for farmers.”

The process of scanning the plants involves a handheld device that utilizes Raman spectroscopy. Raman spectroscopy is an analytical lab technique where scattered light from a laser is used to measure the vibrational modes of molecules—thereby detecting the chemical composition of materials. The laser light interacts with molecular vibrations and provides a chemical fingerprint.

“So essentially, you have a handheld device that is paired with our database, that’s comprised of millions of different data points, and you fire off a laser through the scanner, it scans live complex living tissues, so this is a non-destructive, non-invasive test,” says Molle. “And that scan produces a spectrum, and the spectrum is then sent through our application, it’s read by our algorithms, and you’re produced a result.”

Hot Hemp Horrors 

Just how bad is the hot hemp problem? According to New Frontier Data, over 4,000 acres of roughly 243,00 hemp plants in the U.S. were destroyed for going hot in 2019. In 2020, this only increased to 6,234 acres—despite there being fewer acres planted. According to data from recent years, this number could go up beyond 10,000 acres destroyed, given the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) 2021 definition change of THC limits—now not only limited to 0.3% delta-9 THC, but total THC.

“We’ve talked to farmers who have had to destroy their entire crops before; this is happening less and less because people are becoming more aware of the problems and more aware of how they can mitigate these problems,” Molle says. “But it’s only happening less for the farmers that are aware of it.”

Hemp farmers can usually effectively single out hot hemp, though by the time they’re aware of it, often thousands of dollars have already been wasted. Still, in many states, a lot of hot hemp biomass makes its way into regulated cannabis markets and is sold in vape pens or other products.

“Our tool allows you to become aware of this before you get a COA [certificate of analysis]. Before you send any tests into your local governing bodies, you’re able to use PAMAP to basically predetermine when you will go hot,” Molle says. “So it’s an optimization tool, as well as a testing tool. And it allows farmers to really understand, you know, the levels of THC and understand when they might need to harvest or if they’re too late to harvest, unfortunately, and then they need to kind of come up with a plan B. Our test is able to provide them with all of that information.”

Sexing Plants

In Volume 27, Issue 15 of the peer-reviewed journal Molecules, released in August 2022, Mariposa Technology co-founder and President John K. Roberts III and Molle joined five other co-authors—Nicolas K. Goff, James F. Guenther, Mickal Adler, Greg Mathews, and Dmitry Kurouski—to publish their study of using Raman spectroscopy to sex plants. The journal article demonstrated how they can determine hermaphrodite, male, and female hemp plants based on the detection of different amounts of carotenoids. Carotenoids, or tetraterpenoids, are yellow, orange, and red fat-soluble pigments found in certain plant varieties including cannabis.

The concentration of carotenoids is the greatest in female cannabis, and hermaphrodites demonstrate the lowest carotenoid content, with males in the middle. Specifically, the intensities of carotenoid vibrations detected via spectroscopy were much more intense in female plants than male plants and less intense in hermaphrodites.

“We believe that it’s the carotenoids in the plant,” Roberts says, explaining how they can tell the difference between males, females, and hermaphrodites. “But we haven’t determined it. We have proven that we can successfully do it 100% of the time from male and female plants and 98.7% of the time for monecious [hermaphrodite] plants. But the actual reason that we’re able to determine it is still somewhat of an open scientific question.”

Gender is controversial in the hemp plant world, leading to efforts to ban male hemp plants. In Oregon, Corvallis-based Oregon CBD has fought the state legislature to ban male hemp plants since 2014. The company said wind-blown pollen from a neighboring farm ruined its crops, amounting to an estimated $2.5 million in damages.

Cross-pollination from rogue males creates problems. It’s bad for hemp producers and processors focused on CBD and other non-psychoactive cannabinoids because a pollinated hemp crop loses up to half of its biomass and around 30% of its total cannabinoid content. For farmers focused only on fiber, it’s not as much of a big deal. If plant gender could be determined earlier, some of the damage might be mitigated.

What is Raman Spectroscopy?

Dmitry Kurouski, professor of biochemistry and biophysics at Texas A&M, specializes in Raman spectroscopy technology, using it for everything from identifying components of cannabis to crime scene analysis. For example, Kurouski demonstrated in a study that Raman spectroscopy could determine if a crime scene hair was dyed or natural hair color, something that’s always been a bit of a challenge for law enforcement.

Like with human hairs, Raman spectroscopy can also be used to determine components of cannabis. The laser excites molecules, causing them to vibrate differently from one another and produce different spectra in the readouts.

“A laser is fired, and it only has a millimeter-wide focal point,” Molle says. “So you’re firing a laser into a very concentrated area, and it creates excitation within the photons and the electrons. You then get a vibration that is picked up by the device and reader within the device. So the laser creates excitation, the device picks up that excitation and creates a spectrum based on the vibrations of those molecules. And that’s the reason why it’s such a precise instrument.” 

The motivations behind technology in the world of cannabis go beyond just saving time and money. Hot hemp—especially in states with high altitudes susceptible to higher UV light, which is a trigger for THC production—is an ongoing problem.

Roberts explained that the piece of hardware that does the scanning has existed for about 10 years and is manufactured by Agilent Technologies, though until now, it hasn’t been used for cannabis. Agilent Technologies focuses primarily on ways to improve the overall laboratory workflow. The company was formed as a spin-off of Hewlett-Packard in 1999.

The same tools used previously for crime scene analysis turned out to be ideal for determining characteristics in cannabis as well.

“What happened was Professor Kurouski at Texas A&M, our collaborator and partner in this, discovered that this particular device, which is used for chemical identifications in a wide range of scenarios, had just the right laser, nanometer, and the power of the handheld device that eliminated background scattering from the spectra on live agricultural products,” Roberts explains.

The handheld scanning device is one thing, but it’s essentially worthless if you don’t have the correct data to compare readouts. Mariposa Technology plans to soon offer the handheld detection device via a subscription service following a software update.

“The hardware itself produces a numerical representation of what it’s scanning organic compounds and spectra that you can look at, but it tells you nothing unless you have a data set and a library available to refer and compare that,” Roberts says.

Beyond expediting the cannabis testing process, this technology can further revolutionize the cannabis testing industry by reducing its impact on the environment, given the new shortcuts around materials such as chemicals and solvents used by labs. It’s also a fix that can reduce transportation and other costs.

“What we’re doing is trying very hard to also reduce the carbon footprint of the cannabis testing industry at large,” Molle says. “Our device is very easy to use. And one of the main reasons for that is that you don’t need to have any chemicals or solvents. You don’t need gloves. There’s much less waste involved. There’s no transportation of samples, you know, with a licensed handler, none of that exists with us. So on top of all of the other things that we’re doing, we’re also hoping that we can make the cannabis industry just greener and more eco-friendly at large.”

This article was originally published in the February 2023 issue of High Times Magazine.

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