Hoosiers might have started to notice gummy products labeled “Delta 8” or even “THC” in their corner stores or vape shops over the last few years.
In the state legislature, lawmakers have been tinkering for years with bills to try to regulate these off-brand cannabis products that the federal government accidentally legalized.
The difference between Delta 8 and the kind of marijuana we colloquially call “weed” or “pot” comes down to some chemistry and an arbitrary federal definition.
First, some chemistry
They all come from the same plant, Cannabis sativa. This plant contains hundreds of chemical substances known as cannabanoids.
Tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, is the psychoactive cannabanoid responsible for the “high” associated with marijuana. This is also called Delta 9 THC.
Delta 8 THC is another cannabanoid in the plant. It’s an isomer, or a slightly altered chemical compound related to Delta 9 THC, but less psychoactive.
However, since there isn’t a lot of naturally occurring Delta 8, most Delta 8 on the market is made in a lab and is derived from what the federal government now considers “hemp.” That’s where the federal definitions come in.
How the feds distinguished ‘hemp’ from ‘marijuana’
In the 2018 Farm Bill, Congress wanted to give farmers a legal way to make agricultural textiles from less potent varieties of the cannabis plant, or hemp.
Lawmakers decided to codify a dividing line between legal hemp and illegal marijuana. Hemp would henceforth be known as dry cannabis flower with less than 0.3% concentration of Delta 9 THC, and marijuana, illegal on the federal level, is flower with higher concentrations.
The Farm Bill didn’t address isomers like Delta 8. So the market has innovated all kinds of products and derivatives from plants containing less than 0.3% Delta 9 ― or legal hemp ― including Delta 8, THCa and all kinds of other letters and numbers.
This is the impact of the loophole: It’s possible to sell products containing very high concentrations of Delta 8, enough to mimic intense psychoactive effects, and still abide by that federal definition. THCa, which can also be found in Indiana stores, is another example: when dry, it abides by the legal definition, but when exposed to heat, it chemically transforms into regular Delta 9 THC.
What’s going on with regulation?
A bill to regulate Delta 8 and other hemp-derived THC products died on the last day of the Indiana legislative session.
Meanwhile, the cannabis industry is lobbying Congress heavily to pass an amendment that would close the loophole the Farm Bill created.
For now, there remain no regulations on these products.
Contact IndyStar state government and politics reporter Kayla Dwyer at kdwyer@indystar.com or follow her on Twitter @kayla_dwyer17.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: What’s the difference between Delta 8 THC and marijuana or ‘weed’?
Reporting by Kayla Dwyer, Indianapolis Star / Indianapolis Star
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
