BioBased Formulation Calculator

Calculator is still under construction, thank you for your patience

This resource is provided to illustrate variations in the final biobased content of a product with changes in composition. It is not intended to be used in the manufacturing process and Beta Analytic Inc. cannot be held responsible for any manufacturing decisions made pursuant to its usage. Those decisions are the sole responsibility of the user.

The form below allows you to enter data into a table to derive the biobased content of a manufactured product.

By knowing three variables for each component in the formulation, the calculator will predict the biobased content of the product.

• Variable 1 The biobased content of each component.
• Variable 2 The percent carbon content of each component.
• Variable 3 The percent concentration of each component in the final product.

Variable 1: - The biobased content of each component.

This value is derived from the biobased carbon-14 measurement made on the component. If a measurement has not been made, but you think you know what it is, this is where you would enter it. The format for entering the value is as percent (e.g. 50, 25, 10)

Variable 2: The percent carbon content of each component.

This is the percent carbon in the component relative to the total weight of the component.

For example, the chemical formula for anhydrous ethyl alcohol is C2H6O. The molecular weight of the molecule is 46 grams (2 x 12, + 6 x 1, + 1 x 16). Carbon is 24 grams of the total (2 x12). The percent carbon content of ethyl alcohol is 52% (24/46). The format for entering the value is as percent (e.g. 52, 80, 100)

Variable 3: The fractional concentration of each component in the final product.

This is the relative amount of each component in the total formula. This can be calculated by either volume or weight. If a product is a mixture of only two components, 50% corn ethanol and 50% water, a value of 0.5 would be entered for each component (entered as a decimal fraction). It is important to use the same measure of concentration for each component (e.g. wt/wt% or vol/vol%). A valid result will not be obtained if one component is entered using a wt/wt% measure and another is entered using a vol/vol%. Additionally, the total of all the components must be 1.0 (totaling 100% of the formula).

Using the table is useful both to understand how biobased content varies with re-formulations, and to track-down why a biobased C14 content measurement may be lower than expected.

Example: The default values in the table represent a formulation based on known values for each variable. You can see how the biobased content changes by changing any of the values. To return to the default values and percent biobased content, hit the REFRESH button on your browser.