According to the most recent forecasts provided by Brightfield Group, the market is anticipated to reach $22 billion annually by the year 2020. According to a survey conducted by High Yields Insights, forty percent of adults in the United States over the age of 18 are already interested in trying CBD, and many multinational brands are getting involved in the movement. Coca-Cola, Anheuser-Busch InBev, and Starbucks are all testing the waters with CBD products.
There appears to be a gap between the supply of hemp and the demand in the market, despite the fact that its popularity has been on the rise and that new legislation pertaining to hemp was included in the Farm Bill of 2018. The difficulty is not in locating raw hemp or in selling the product of the extraction; rather, the stumbling block is found in the extraction process itself. Mile High Labs is reacting to this missing link with the first commercial-scale extraction technology that is exclusively developed for hemp. This achievement comes on the heels of a record-breaking Series A fundraising round that took place in 2018.
A Revolutionary Change in How We Think About Extraction
Up until this point, the majority of companies that produce hemp CBD oils have relied on extraction methods that were originally developed for marijuana (THC). These procedures nearly typically involve working in tiny batches and require specialized laboratory equipment. Because of the stringent regulations placed on the final product and the fact that it is typically only distributed in the immediate area, THC extraction in small batches is an economically viable option. When it comes to something as heavily regulated as marijuana, there are limits to how far one can take the scaling up of the extraction process.
On the other side, the hemp business is developing large worldwide alliances and has witnessed a substantial shift in the regulatory climate over the course of the past six months. Producing CBD oil naturally requires a significant increase in the amount of raw materials utilized compared to any comparable THC oil production process. The requirements of a developing industry and the prospective demands of companies like Coca-Cola are not something that can be met by smaller extraction facilities.
The Mile High Monster was made available to the general public on March 15, 2018, and it has already contributed to a 500 percent boost in the capacity of Mile High Labs, which is a refinery based in Loveland, Colorado. This immediate improvement was made possible by the installation of a single piece of equipment at a hemp field in Eastern Colorado. Mile High Labs anticipates an additional 500 percent growth in the near future, which will coincide with the addition of a second machine in Southern Colorado. Each Monster that feeds on hemp is able to process fifty acres of raw hemp material during the span of a single day, which results in the production of six barrels of crude hemp oil.
The Monster is a sizable piece of machinery that can be used on farms to simulate the wells that are typically found in the oil and gas business. The modular extraction Monster is brought onto the farm by hemp farmers in partnership with Mile High Labs. This allows the farmers to keep all initial crude extraction on-site and under their control.
The Monster is a significant departure from the small-batch CBD extraction methods that are more suited to the medicinal marijuana business. The hemp industry will at long last have access to a method of extraction that is practical on a commercial scale once a scalable piece of equipment such as the Mile High Monster is implemented.
Establishing a Partnership That Will Be of Benefit to Both Parties
Stephen Mueller, founder and chief technology officer of Mile High Labs, claims that modern-day hemp farmers do not work in the same manner as their contemporaries who cultivate other conventional crops. In the traditional market, a farmer would never sow seeds until there was a contract in place for the harvest. In the modern market, however, farmers can sow seeds whenever they want. On the other hand, hemp farmers have largely disregarded this conventional method in favor of a more unconventional strategy in the hope of capitalizing on the boom in the hemp industry. There is frequently a harvest that does not have a concluding purchaser.
Through the placement of each Mile High Monster on a hemp farm in the state of Colorado, Mile High Labs establishes a special and mutually beneficial relationship with each farm. Farmers are assured of a market for their hemp, and Mile High Labs is ensured of a steady supply of the raw material it requires to manufacture CBD compounds on a large scale. In addition, there is no requirement to transport the cumbersome raw plant material to an appropriate processor located off the farm. Farmers simply need to make preparations for six barrels of crude to be shipped to a processing facility as opposed to making plans to transfer fifty acres of raw material there. Arguably, six barrels is a much simpler logistical task.