In order to make premium CBD oil drops, gummies, topicals, etc., we have to get the CBD out of plant material. How do we do that? Through something known as CO2 extraction. There are other ways, but we believe CO2 extraction is the best method. It yields the purest results, but more on that in a bit.

The key to what we do is the plant material itself. We source hemp plants only from the most trusted growers in Colorado and California. We are very choosy about the plant material we accept for the simple fact that plant quality has a direct impact on our quality. Everything from broad-spectrum CBD oil to topical CBD products requires high quality extracts.

More About Hemp

The starting place for CBD extraction is the hemp plant. Hemp is considered any strain of cannabis with 0.3% THC or less. Nearly all the CBD sold at retail in this country comes from industrial plants. Thanks to 2018 legislation that legalized industrial hemp, we now have access to a plentiful supply.

Extracting CBD from hemp is no simple matter. Why? Because you cannot extract just CBD alone. All cannabis plants contain more than a hundred cannabinoids and terpenes, along with flavonoids, fatty acids, and other compounds. CO2 extraction captures them all. We still have to separate the CBD from everything else.

What Extraction Does

CBD and the other compounds we want are found in the form of oils contained within plant material. Those oils have to be pulled out one way or another. Perhaps the easiest way to do so is through steam distillation. However, steam distillation yields inconsistent results and poor quality.

Another option is solvent extraction. You might use a chemical or natural solvent to break down plant material to free up CBD oil. Although this method is effective, it yields less-than-pure oils. That leaves us with one other method: CO2 extraction.

Extracting with CO2 combines heat, pressure, and carbon dioxide to simultaneously break down plant material and release oil. The CO2 dissipates, leaving us with the purest form of CBD oil we can get. From there, it is on to distillation.

Separating the Various Components

Extracted CBD oil can be filtered (to remove plant material residue) and packaged as full-spectrum oil. A full-spectrum product contains all the cannabinoids, terpenes, etc. extracted from the plant. To make other products though, we send the oil through a distillation process that separates the oil into its multiple components.

Distillation is a process human beings mastered thousands of years ago. It is a pretty simple process, too – at least in principle. It is based on the fact that different compounds (in liquid form) have different boiling points.

Distilling CBD oil starts with subjecting the oil to heat and pressure. As the temperature increases, different components within the oil reach boiling point and evaporate. The vapor leaves the heated chamber and is instantly cooled, transforming it back into a liquid that can be collected and taken away.

A Plant with so Much Potential

In the years we have been in business, we have discovered that hemp is a plant with a ton of potential. Like you, we have discovered that CBD can help people live better lives. Some of us use it to promote overall health and well-being. Others use it for more specific purposes. Either way, we all benefit.

Thanks to CO2 extraction, distillation, and other techniques our industry utilizes, we are able to take hemp plant material and transform it into a full range of quality CBD products. We are thrilled to be able to do so.