How carbon capture can rewrite surfactant chemistry in personal care

Carbon capture is emerging as a climate-friendly cosmetics solution, according to green chemistry company Viridi. 

The technology converts captured emissions into beauty feedstocks, introducing a cycle within production. It works by capturing CO2 emissions and converting them into new materials, chemicals, or products.

Dr. Daniel Stewart, co-founder and CEO of Viridi, tells Personal Care Insights: “By replacing palm-based feedstocks with captured carbon dioxide, we are enabling the industry to drastically reduce product carbon footprint, ensure compliance with tightening regulations, and deliver better-performing ingredients for consumer products.”

The UK-based company is tapping carbon capture in personal care with its palm-oil and 1,4-dioxane-free, CO2-based anionic surfactant, Vireya. The company calls the product the “world’s first” commercial anionic surfactant produced using captured CO2 as a principal feedstock. It is designed for home care and personal care applications.

“Vireya marks a fundamental step change in surfactant chemistry… Crucially, manufacturers can produce Vireya using their current assets,” says Stewart.

Consumer demand for sustainability is moving upstream, with expectations for ecologically mindful solutions considering the full production cycle. Factors like corporate carbon footprints and resource strain are being increasingly considered in this holistic understanding of product sustainability.

Stewart tells us repurposing CO2 emissions for the beauty supply chain helps reduce reliance on fossil- and land-intensive sourcing “while still meeting expectations for safety, efficacy, quality, and price.”Carbon capture technology offers a new route to lower-impact beauty formulations. 

Sparing natural feedstocks in beauty

Stewart says carbon utilization could play a key role in reducing the cosmetic industry’s environmental impact.

“For example, captured CO2 can be used as a practical carbon source for high-performance ingredients, helping reduce product carbon footprint and pressure on land-based raw materials. Their impact will be greatest where they can scale within existing manufacturing infrastructure and maintain the performance, safety, quality, and cost the industry requires.”

He says that for personal care, the value of CO2-derived ingredients is not primarily about storing carbon permanently in the finished product, but about changing where the carbon used to make that ingredient comes from. Replacing a proportion of the resource-intensive raw materials used in functional ingredients with captured CO2 can mitigate carbon footprints and detrimental ecological effects.

“The meaningful climate benefit, therefore, depends on the carbon intensity of the materials being replaced, the efficiency of the production process, and the ability to deploy the technology at a meaningful scale,” Stewart explains.

Future CO2 capturing avenues

The company calls Vireya a first step in its broader ambitions to decarbonize the surfactant sector. Stewart says that one of the company’s “most striking findings” was the ingredient’s mildness profile.

“Zein testing has shown substantially lower irritation potential than conventional benchmarks such as sodium laureth sulfate, while maintaining the foaming and cleansing performance expected from an anionic surfactant.”

At the time of the surfactants’ launch, the company reported up to 70% reduction in product carbon footprint and a tenfold improvement in skin mildness compared with incumbent benchmarks. The ingredient achieved the mild profile without using 1,4-dioxane, which can occur as a byproduct or contaminant during the manufacturing of certain ethoxylated cosmetic ingredients.

This combination of efficacy and mildness is relevant for formulators developing shampoos, body washes, and facial cleansers for personal care. Stewart tells us that while surfactants are “the immediate opportunity,” captured CO2 offers potential applications across a broader range of personal care ingredients.

“The bigger opportunity is to introduce a new source of carbon into an industry that still depends heavily on fossil- and land-intensive feedstocks.”Vireya is designed as a palm oil and 1,4-dioxane-free surfactant solution. 

Limiting factors and moving forward

In producing ecologically friendly alternatives for the personal care sector, formulators and manufacturers often face the complexity of adopting a new ingredient while trying to fulfill its environmental potential.

“The main barriers are the same ones faced by any new ingredient technology: demonstrating performance and safety, validating formulations, achieving consistent quality, and reaching commercial scale at the right cost… A lower-impact material must still meet strict safety requirements, work within complex formulations, and perform reliably at commercial scale,” Stewart explains.

“Ingredients made using captured CO2 show why drop-in innovation matters; the strongest solutions will improve carbon and land-use performance while fitting existing production systems and maintaining efficacy, sensory experience, quality, and cost.”

Stewart says that companies need to abandon vague sustainability language and unsubstantiated claims for specific, measurable evidence.

“For carbon-derived ingredients, this means quantifying product carbon-footprint reductions, clearly identifying which conventional raw materials have been replaced and distinguishing between the impact of an ingredient and that of the finished formulation.”

“Credible claims should be supported by recognized assessment methods and communicate exactly what has improved, without suggesting that one change makes the entire product sustainable.”