Biobased content

What is biobased content?

A product’s carbon can come from two kinds of source: recently living material, such as plants, algae and animal by-products, or fossil material, such as petroleum, natural gas and coal. Biobased content is the fraction that is biological. A product with 100 percent biobased content contains no fossil carbon; one at 60 percent draws 60 percent of its organic carbon from biological sources.

How it is measured

Biobased content is measured with ASTM D6866. The method detects carbon-14, which is present in carbon from living sources and absent from fossil carbon, and calculates the biobased share of the product’s organic carbon. The USDA BioPreferred Program uses this measurement for its Certified Biobased Product label.

What biobased content does and does not tell you

• It measures carbon only, not total weight. Water, minerals and other inorganic ingredients are not counted.
• It says where the carbon came from, not what happens after use. Biodegradability and toxicity are separate properties.
• It does not by itself describe how sustainably the raw materials were produced.

Biobased content in surfactants

Surfactants can be fully biobased, partly biobased, or fossil-based. A bio-based surfactant made from plant oils and sugars can be close to 100 percent biobased, while one that combines a plant-derived fatty chain with petrochemical ethylene oxide is only partly biobased. Biosurfactants made by fermentation of plant feedstocks are typically fully biobased.

Frequently asked questions