What Does Hemp Hurd Mean?
Also referred to as shives, or hemp wood, hemp hurds are an agricultural product that is produced from hemp. Hemp hurds are the woody inner parts of the hemp stalk. They are broken into fragments and separated from the fiber by breaking and scutching them. Scutching is a process that helps separate the impurities from the raw materials and can be done either by hand of by a machine called a scutcher.
Hemp hurds are similar to the shives in flax but are a bit coarser and usually softer in texture. Hemp hurds are highly absorbent and rich in cellulose. They have a great thermal and acoustic property and are found in the soft inner core of the hemp plant stem.
Maximum Yield Explains Hemp Hurd
There are many uses for hemp hurds such as making sustainable animal beddings, especially for horses. Hemp hurds can also be used as a greener type of construction materials, such as with hemp concrete (hempcrete), biodegradable garden mulch, lightweight particle board, acoustic ceilings and wall tiles, non-wood plastic fillers, and other various environmental friendly bio-products. Hemp hurds can also be converted into hemp pellets in order to produce a renewable source of residential heating.
When hemp hurds are densified, they turn into another material called hemp pellets. Hemp pellets are thought to be suitable for fuel flexible pellet stoves and boilers. These green pellets (another name for hemp pellets) produce about two per cent ash and since most of the pellet stoves and boilers are designed specifically to burn the pellets with an ash content below per cent, they can be used in a much large range of pellet burners.
Hemp pellets are also said to be not more corrosive than wood pellets when burning, which can't be said for pellets made from straw, miscanthus, and switchgrass.
Another material that can be produced from hemp hurds are hemp fill. Hemp fill can be useful in the plastic industries by providing for a tree-free sustainable agricultural filler once it has been compounded and pelleted.
