“Alcohol Free” explained

• Many personal care products today are marketed using the claim “alcohol-free”
• This can be an important claim for people who wish to avoid the drying effects alcohol has on the skin
• Important for Muslims seeking Halal products in which alcohol is not permitted
• Several ingredients used in skincare can be confusing to the layman/general public
•  Many alcohol-free skincare products would appear to non-scientists to actually contain alcohols, such as PHENOXYETHANOL, CETYL ALCOHOL, BENZYL ALCOHOL
• PHENOXYETHANOL looks and sounds like an alcohol, it is actually a glycol ether, and has different properties to alcohols. It is a thick liquid
• CETYL ALCOHOL is a hard wax like substance obtained from Palm Oil
• BENZYL ALCOHOL is a natural constituent of many essential oils including Jasmine and Ylang Ylang
• These ingredients are actually “ethanol-free”.
• The reason for the apparent confusion is the difference between the terms used by scientists and those used by the general public
• The old term for ethanol was ethyl alcohol – hence the use of the word “alcohol”
• To the layman, beer, wines and spirits, etc. contain alcohol; to the scientist, they contain ethanol
• To the layman, alcohol is a single substance, but scientifically speaking ‘Alcohol’ describes a whole group of substances with differing properties
• Phenoxyethanol, Cetyl Alcohol and Benzyl Alcohol are “alcohol-free” and acceptable as Halal ingredients