What's so great about green chemistry? Last week's launch of the Citropol range of novel, renewable cosmetics ingredients , was for P2, the culmination of years of work in the lab, pilot plant and plant, diligently applying the principles of green chemistry to a nature inspired vision.

First and fundamentally, chemistry is life and supports life. Everything we do or think is the result of chemistry. Everything in nature is chemistry. Everything we make and use (iPhones, cars ) is made using chemistry. Not all chemistry is the same and chemistry is always evolving - getting better. Green Chemistry is a journey not a destination (cliché but so so true in this case). Green Chemistry principles are applied continually to find better ways and routes of making safer, better, ultimately healthier products. Green Chemistry often looks to nature for inspiration.

Now, today, on an emotional level consumers are not only more “fussy” about what is in the products they buy, they are really starting to care as much about what they put on their body as what they put in their body. Since the industrial revolution, humans have become less engaged with nature and less in tune with the natural cycles of birth, life, death, rebirth etc. Today we are seeing a reawakening of interest in such things. Using a product on your skin which has a provenance going back to the forest resonates emotionally and even spiritually with more and more people today. A rabbi friend of mine told me that there’s holiness in beauty and beauty in holiness. I would add that, because chemistry is literally the stuff of life, there can be both beauty and holiness in chemistry. The closer we bring cosmetics and similar consumer products back to the chemistry of nature, the more we instill beauty and a sense of holiness into their use. The daily beauty ritual of many consumers, especially today, approaches the transcendent and is reminiscent of a sacramental experience. Products which are in tune with the rhythms of nature are a suitable accompaniment to such a practice.

An intensive moisturizer with a mild pH of 5.2 and viscosity greater than 60,000 cPs. This prototype is 100% naturally-derived! It's also pleasant, odor neutral with excellent non-greasy emolliency and skin aesthetics.