MCR Labs has opened its third cannabis testing lab, its first in the state of Maine.
The lab company is primarily based in Framingham, Massachusetts; it opened its second location in Pennsylvania last January.
Its new Maine facility is located in the city of Gardiner and offers testing for cannabis potency, terpene profiles, and contamination from microbes, residual solvents, and heavy metals.
Cannabis labs in Maine
Indeed, the Maine Office of Marijuana Policy (MOMP) requires all legal adult-use cannabis samples to be tested for residual solvents, pesticides, molds and microbes, and cannabinoid potencies.
The state regulator licensed its two cannabis labs, Nelson Analytical and Nova Analytic Labs, early last year. Since then, one other lab, CatLab, has received a full, “active” status from the MOMP.
According to the MOMP website, MCR Labs’ Gardiner facility has a “pending condition” status. In the meantime, the lab will seemingly only test medical cannabis samples.
Unlike recreational cannabis, medical marijuana products in Maine aren’t mandated to undergo testing. But many medical companies still choose to send samples to state labs regardless.
One such “medical-only” lab, ProVerde Laboratories, was shut down by Maine authorities last January for operating without a permit or a license.
Responding to Analytical Cannabis at the time, ProVerde’s president and chief scientific officer, Chris Hudalla, explained that the Maine lab was “in operation before there were any requirements or mechanisms for licensing of marijuana testing laboratories in Maine.”
“We had not completed our application when the temporary license expired,” he added. “Based on that, we were asked to halt our laboratory operation, which we complied with immediately.”
