Adipic acid derives its vegan and vegetarian status from nitric acid, cyclohexanol, glucose.
| Vegan? Yes | Vegetarian? Yes |
Classifications are made based on the available commercial supply of the ingredient, and are made based on the criteria on our classifications page.
Adipic acid is a white crystalline solid used as a food acidity regulator. It is commercially manufactured from by the nitric acid oxidation of cyclohexanol or using genetically modified enzymes to ferment glucose. Note that according to one manufacturer concacted by the VRG, oleic acid was used as a defoaming agent in the production and was present in the final product at a few parts per million. We do not mark it as maybe vegan here for this reason, but you can change its vegan status in the app. Although there are some articles online suggesting transitioning to biomass-derived feedstock, it seems the majority (or all) of the current commercial manufacturers still use the traditional cyclohexanol route.
Sources
- https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/Adipic-Acid
- https://www.vrg.org/ingredients/#adipicacid
- Vy Tran, A., Park, S.-K., Jin Lee, H., Yong Kim, T., Kim, Y., Suh, Y.-W., Lee, K.-Y., Jin Kim, Y., & Baek, J. (2022). Efficient Production of Adipic Acid by a Two‐Step Catalytic Reaction of Biomass‐Derived 2,5‐Furandicarboxylic Acid. ChemSusChem, 15(10). Portico.
https://doi.org/10.1002/cssc.202200375 - https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2020-10/documents/b06s02.pdf
- Musser, M. T. (2000). Adipic Acid. Ullmann’s Encyclopedia of Industrial Chemistry. Portico.
https://doi.org/10.1002/14356007.a01_269