Business owners, stakeholders, and community members have until Thursday, Feb. 8, to comment on the proposed amendments to the Illinois Industrial Hemp Act. December 26, 2023, the Illinois General Assembly Joint Committee on Administrative Rules (JCAR) and the Illinois Department of Agriculture (DOA) released several proposed amendments, including new administrative rules that would add THCa and delta-9 THC to the total concentration level limits of 0.3% or less on a dry weight basis.

New testing methodologies would incorporate “Total THC” after the process of decarboxylation. Total THC would be defined as, “the value determined after the process of decarboxylation, or the application of a conversion factor if the testing methodology does not include decarboxylation, that expressed the potential total delta-9 tetrahydrocannabinol content derived from the sum of the THC and THCA content and reported on a dry weight basis.”

According to this definition, “‘Post Decarboxylation Value,’ in the context of testing methodologies for THC concentration in hemp, means a value determined after the process of decarboxylation that determines the total potential delta-9 tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) content derived from the sum of the THC and delta-9- tetrahydrocannabinolic acid (THCA) content and reported on a dry weight basis.” Both amendments continued by defining proper techniques to calculate total potential THC in a given sample.

Decarboxylated is defined as, “the completion of the chemical reaction that converts THC-acid (THCA) into delta-9-THC, the intoxicating component of cannabis. The decarboxylated value is calculated using a molecule mass conversion ratio that sums delta-9-THC and 87.7% of THC-acid ((delta-9 THC) + (0.877 * THCA)).”

Other significant proposed amendments can be found in our original article here.

To comment on the proposed amendments, until Feb. 8, reach out to Sam McGee at DOA, State Fairgrounds, P. O. Box 19281, Springfield, IL, 62794-9281, by phone at 217-558-3741, or by email at Samuel.mcgee@illinois.gov.

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