March 02, 2026

BIO-BASED HAIRCARE

If your not ready to give up the lather all together 100% bio-based surfactants are what you want if your wanting to avoid petrochemicals.

To be certified as 100% bio-based, a product must meet these criteria:

The certification (often USDA Bio-Preferred) uses radiocarbon dating to measure the amount of "new" carbon in a material.

Bio-based carbon comes from plants, animals, or marine materials that have recently "fixed" CO2 from the atmosphere.
Fossil carbon comes from oil or coal that has been underground for millions of years.
100% Bio-based means that every single carbon atom in that surfactant can be traced back to a renewable plant source.

Even if a product is "naturally derived," it isn't always 100% bio-based.

Many surfactants are created by reacting a plant-based fatty acid with a synthetic chemical derived from petroleum. This results in a "hybrid" molecule that might only be 60% or 80% bio-based and can still contain contaminants like 1-4 dioxane.

Carbon Neutrality: Plants absorb CO2 as they grow, so using 100% bio-based ingredients helps keep the carbon cycle "closed" rather than adding "new" carbon from the ground into the atmosphere.
Microplastics: 100% bio-based materials are more compatible with natural decomposition processes, meaning they are less likely to persist as environmental pollutants compared to synthetic plastics or resins.