What is Propylene Glycol?

What is Propylene Glycol?

By: Tiffany Davis

Flavor Vapor Media Specialist

You may have heard people talk about PG & VG. These are acronyms for Propylene Glycol and Vegetable Glycerin. There is a lot of media speculation about these chemicals and if they are safe to inhale. Propylene Glycol is an organic compound. It is a colorless, almost odorless, clear syrupy consist antsy, and has a light sweet taste. When PG is heated it can produce vapor. The chemical compound is made by reaction of propylene oxide with water.

There are common misconceptions that PG is an ingredient in antifreeze. What people fail to realize is that yes industrial grade PG is an ingredient in NON-TOXIC antifreeze. This is a media scare tactic to give people false impressions of e-cigarettes and personal vaporizers. Industrial grade propylene glycol or PGI is also found polyester resins, urethanes, coolants and antifreeze, heat transfer fluid, and paints and coatings. PG is also used as a solvent in printing inks, floral preservatives, and a stabilizer in hydraulic fluids.

The propylene glycol found in e-juice has purity greater than 99.8%. PG was approved ingredient in cosmetics by the Personal Care Products Council. PG has a slew of uses such as: e-juice, wetting agent, used to compound citrus and emulsified flavors, solvent in pharmaceutical preparations, and emulsifier in cosmetic and pharmaceutical creams, ingredient for low-heat and heat transfer fluids, and effective humectant. This is why we can find PG in almost anything like:

Personal Care Items:  shampoos, hair gel, shaving creams, toothpaste, baby wipes, sunscreen, mouthwashes, deodorants, and fragrances.

Food and Drinks items: PG is excellent to carry flavors of our food and drinks. To keep food moist this also includes pet and livestock food! PG is used to keep bakery and other items moist and last longer in packaging.

Pharmaceutical uses include: Used as a carrier of active ingredients in vaccines, cough syrups or gel capsules to help deliver this substances within the body, vitamins and hormones, local anesthetics, antiseptics, and breathing treatments.

As you can tell there are many uses for PG and PGI. It has been used for over 50 years and has been deemed to have very little toxicity. The Food and Drug Administration has classified propylene glycol as GRAS, “generally recognized as safe,” which means that it is acceptable for use in flavorings, drugs, and cosmetics, and as a direct food additives. In the body, under conditions of normal low exposure, propylene glycol is quickly metabolized and eliminated. Its metabolic pathway is comparable to that of sugar: propylene glycol is rapidly converted into lactic acid, just like what happens with sugar (energy) while exercising. The lactic acid formed by propylene glycol ingestion is then discarded by the body via the urine. Over the 50 years of use there have been no long term health effects.

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