Glass Pharms Pen Agreement To Create First Carbon Negative Cultivation Facility In UK

Glass Pharms, which cultivate for the UK medicines market, just announced that it will put up an investment valued at £22.5 million to create the first dedicated medical cannabis cultivation facility that will be 100% carbon negative. 

The new cultivation facility is an advanced 2.5-hectare greenhouse located south of England. An anaerobic digestion plant powers the greenhouse, transforming food waste into electricity. 

The facility will use the plant’s hot water to heat and cool the entire greenhouse. Although Glass Pharms announced the new greenhouse would be carbon negative, it still must verify its status to health and safety regulators. 

Besides creating the world’s first carbon-negative cannabis cultivation facility, Glass Pharms also recently became the first in the UK to obtain commercial licensing for third-party supply.

According to Agrigate Global, the majority of all medical cannabis distributed to patients in the United Kingdom is imported from other countries, and there are evident inconsistencies within the quality of the flower and meeting supply needs.

For this reason, Glass Pharms wanted to change how UK patients get their medical cannabis by obtaining the first commercial license in the UK granted by the Home Office to give high THC cannabis flower to permitted third parties like pharmaceutical companies.

Glass Pharms will grow standard medical cannabis abiding by all regulations to supply UK pharmacies and clinics with quality, homegrown medical cannabis.

James Duckenfield, CEO of Glass Pharms, noted in a press release about the cultivation facility that his company will “underpin” a secure supply chain of medical cannabis to the United Kingdom while striving to make a “real contribution towards the UK’s Net Zero targets.”

Glass Pharms promises pharma-grade cultivation. It’s challenging for cultivation facilities to grow by the regulations required by the pharmaceutical sector of the medical cannabis industry inside conventional greenhouses.

For these reasons, the Glass Pharms cultivation facility hopes to reach these standards by using various strategies like AI-based environmental management systems to oversee several cultivation factors.

Duckenfield concluded his press release by ensuring us that the result will be a “replicable end product,” meaning that the United Kingdom’s medical cannabis patients will see many benefits from local, fresh medicine that “meets their requirements for quality with a predictable supply.”

Because the agreement to create a cultivation facility of up to £22.5 million is the largest infrastructure investment in the UK for medical cannabis, Glass Pharms hope to demonstrate that its facilities will be one of the main strengths behind the country’s medical cannabis industry.