Victura Hemp: Hemp + Lime

What we build, how we build, and where we build have significant impacts to both human and environmental health. The current materials and manufacturing processes that make up our built environments are mostly petrochemical products that contribute significant amounts of greenhouse gases and pollute our world. There is an increased demand for all industries to find renewable and sustainable materials, coupled with higher efficiency manufacturing that can be deployed to fight the world's climate crisis. One of these alternate materials is a combination of industrial hemp, lime and water, known as hempcrete.

Hempcrete is a natural product with a wide range of valuable characteristics including its thermal performance, lightness, fire resistance and low environmental impact. Hemp and lime have been used almost exclusively in the construction industry with excellent results in countries all over the world, but is experiencing a slower adaptation in the United States.

For most of the past century hemp has been categorized as a schedule 1 psychotropic. This changed in December 2018 when the Agricultural Improvement Act, also known as the Farm Bill, was passed and reclassified hemp as an agricultural commodity, but the damage from this prohibition has left the United States behind most of the world in the supply of hemp and the processes required to break down the plant into usable materials. There have been major efforts to catch up, but the pace towards serious change remains slow due to many factors, most notably the public's negative connotation with hemp and the lack of knowledge of how valuable the hemp plants can be.

It is important that the word spreads about hemp + lime so there is a faster adoption in our industries to push research, execution, and ultimately cleaner and healthier building practices. How can you leverage the properties of hemp + lime in desirable and unique ways to expose more of the public to the power and possibilities of hemp? The hunger for green alternatives is at an all-time high, but remains at a premium price to implement, leaving the cheapest and dirtiest products to thrive in the world. A higher demand for hemp will incentivize farmers to rotate hemp through their growing fields and the number of US processors will grow allowing for affordable, locally-sourced and processed hemp to be a major tool in a healthier and cleaner future.