Product Overview
Glycerin USP Grade — also sold as glycerol or 1,2,3-propanetriol — is a viscous, hygroscopic liquid we stock and ship daily from our Taylor, TX warehouse. It is the workhorse humectant and solvent behind pharmaceutical formulations, cosmetic moisturizers, and food products, and it also earns its keep in industrial roles: antifreeze blends, plasticizer work, and tobacco moisture control. Buyers who order this product from us are typically formulators, compounding operations, cosmetic manufacturers, and plant purchasing managers who need USP-grade material with documentation, not a drum of mystery liquid.
Every order leaves our dock in compatible packaging — quarts and gallons for bench and pilot work, drums and totes for production — packed by the same team that handles regulated hazmat freight every day. Glycerin is one of the easier products we ship, and we treat it with the same discipline.
Why This Concentration
Grade is the decision here, not concentration. USP Grade means the material is produced and tested to the purity expectations of pharmacopeia-grade glycerin — the tier formulators reach for when the glycerin touches a drug product, a cosmetic, or a food application. If your glycerin ends up on skin, in a capsule, or in something a person consumes, a technical or industrial grade is the wrong call; specify USP.
For purely mechanical duties — a heat-transfer loop, a mold release, a dust-control blend — USP Grade still works, and some buyers standardize on it anyway to keep one glycerin in the plant instead of two. The trade-off is simple: you pay for purity you may not strictly need, but you eliminate the risk of the wrong drum reaching the wrong process line. Operations with mixed formulation and utility uses often find that single-grade discipline is cheaper than a cross-contamination incident.
Chemical Profile
Glycerin carries the formula C3H8O3 with a molecular weight of 92.09, CAS number 56-81-5. It appears as a colorless to brown liquid; it is combustible but may require some effort to ignite. Density runs 1.261 at 68 °F — denser than water, so it will sink rather than float in a spill scenario. It is highly water-soluble, at greater than or equal to 100 mg/mL at 64 °F, which is why cleanup and dilution are straightforward. Vapor pressure is very low: 0.0025 mmHg at 122 °F, rising to 40 mmHg only at 388 °F, so it does not flash off or fume under normal warehouse or process conditions. The odor is mild. In hand, it behaves exactly as the numbers suggest: a heavy, slow-pouring, stable liquid that draws moisture from the air if you leave a container open.
Industrial Applications
Glycerin's value comes from three behaviors: it holds water, it dissolves things, and it stays put. That translates into steady demand across very different industries.
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Pharmaceutical excipients. Glycerin serves as a solvent, humectant, and viscosity component in oral, topical, and other dosage forms. This is the application that defines the USP grade — formulators need pharmacopeia-tier material with lot documentation behind it.
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Cosmetic moisturizers. As a humectant, glycerin pulls and holds moisture at the skin surface, which is why it appears in lotions, creams, soaps, and cleansers across the personal-care category.
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Food applications. Glycerin functions as a humectant, sweetener, and preservative component in food manufacturing, keeping products moist and extending shelf stability.
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Antifreeze and heat-transfer formulations. Glycerin depresses the freezing point of aqueous systems, making it a base for freeze-protection blends where a glycol alternative is wanted.
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Plasticizer work. In plastics, resins, films, and coatings, glycerin adds flexibility and workability to otherwise brittle systems.
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Tobacco humectant. Glycerin maintains moisture in tobacco products, preventing them from drying out through processing and storage.
Handling & Storage
Glycerin is one of the tamer liquids in our warehouse. It is not classified as hazardous under GHS based on available data (per the product's GHS classification), and no signal word or hazard pictogram applies. That said, treat it like the industrial material it is: wear gloves and goggles when transferring, keep it off walkways — a glycerin spill is slick and slow to clean — and remember it is combustible even though it takes some effort to ignite.
Store it cool, dry, and out of direct sunlight in compatible containers; HDPE and glass both work well. Keep it away from strong oxidizing agents, which are its main incompatibility. Because glycerin is hygroscopic, keep containers tightly closed — an open drum will slowly pull water out of the air and drift off spec. With those basics covered, sealed glycerin is shelf-stable for the long haul.
Hazmat & Shipping
Canonical transport status is not regulated. Review the current SDS and carrier requirements before shipment.
Documentation
A Safety Data Sheet ships with every order, available in English, Spanish, French, and Japanese. A lot-specific Certificate of Analysis is available for the material you receive — for pharmaceutical, cosmetic, and food buyers, that lot traceability is usually the difference between a vendor you can qualify and one you can't. A Technical Data Sheet is also available if your engineering or QA team needs it before purchase.
Why Buy from Alliance Chemical
We are a chemical distributor that ships hazmat daily from Taylor, Texas — which means the easy freight, like glycerin, gets handled with the same DOT-compliant discipline as the hard freight. Orders are packed by operators who move drums and totes for a living, documentation is in the box, and our shipping guidance is reviewed by a DOT Hazmat Specialist. You get quarts for the bench, drums for the line, and totes for the plant, all from stock, without hazmat fees on this product. When your process depends on the glycerin actually showing up, on spec and on time, that is the whole job — and it is the job we do every day.
