Menthol

Measuring Menthol in fine cut tobacco after the maker i. e. in cigarettes is necessary in order to maintain the specified menthol content in menthol cigarettes; this also applies for fine cut menthol tobacco for “roll your own” and for snuff tobacco.

Currently Menthol is measured by means of Gas Chromatography (GC); cigarettes are taken at random right after the maker (when Menthol is applied directly in the maker) or out of cigarette packs (when Menthol is applied to the filters before the maker). This measurement including sample preparation takes several hours until the results are available; in meantime several millions of cigarettes with an incorrect menthol content may have been produced which in many cases cannot be recycled; even recycling in this case is a costly venture.

Apart from that the Center for Tobacco Products (CTP) of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is currently investigating the impact of menthol additives in cigarettes on public health; a report on the findings of this is going to be published shortly¹. This will imply that new limits of menthol content in cigarettes and other tobacco products will be set up which will have to be monitored closely. A fast laboratory method for menthol is therefore necessary in order to avoid excessive costs for recycling or even incinerating whole batches.