Peg-20 Stearate ●
TL;DR. This ingredient is a nonionic emulsifier and solubilizer, mainly used to help blend oils, waxes, and water into stable creams, lotions, and cleansing systems.
What does Peg-20 Stearate do in a cosmetic formula?
This ingredient is a nonionic emulsifier and solubilizer, mainly used to help blend oils, waxes, and water into stable creams, lotions, and cleansing systems.
Is Peg-20 Stearate clean?
Clean-beauty frameworks often flag it because ethoxylation can leave trace manufacturing residues such as 1,4-dioxane if purification is not well controlled. On skin, it is generally low-irritation, so the concern is more about processing quality and restricted-list friction than routine tolerability.
Is Peg-20 Stearate sustainable?
This material is typically made from a fatty acid feedstock, often plant-derived, combined with a petrochemical ethoxylation input. Its sustainability profile is mixed because sourcing may involve palm supply chains, and the ethoxylated portion is less aligned with simple renewable, low-residue chemistry.
Is Peg-20 Stearate COSMOS-approved?
It is not permitted under COSMOS-natural or COSMOS-organic standards because ethoxylated materials are excluded. From a Green Chemistry view, it has useful functionality at low levels, but its petrochemical processing route and residue-control requirements weaken its alignment.
How does Peg-20 Stearate work chemically?
The molecule is a nonionic polyether fatty ester, with a hydrophilic ethoxylate segment attached to a lipophilic long-chain fatty acid residue. It is commonly used in the low single-digit percentage range as an oil-in-water emulsifier or co-emulsifier and is generally stable across typical cosmetic pH ranges.
Last updated 2026-05-13