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Is 95% ethanol plus 5% water consider as food grade ethanol?

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  • $\begingroup$ Welcome to the site! Please take a moment to acquaint yourself with the customs here, primarily by sharing your thoughts on the matter you're asking questions about. $\endgroup$
    – tschoppi
    Nov 5, 2014 at 12:26

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The grade of ethanol does not depend on the water and ethanol percentages, but rather on what else is in there. If your mixture is truly 95-5 ethanol-water, with nothing else in it, than that would be safe to consume (accounting for the health hazards of consuming too much ethanol of course).

However, there might be traces of e.g. methanol or benzene in the ethanol, which are both highly toxic to humans and therefore cannot be present in food grade ethanol mixtures. According to this website the FCC grade and above are food grade, in particular due to some heavy metal specifications, so apparently there might also be trace heavy metals in the ethanol.

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  • $\begingroup$ Thanks Michiel for the explanation. If methanol considered as highly toxic if consumed by human, how about the food grade methanol? Can we used it in manufacturing of food? $\endgroup$
    – nadiya
    Nov 7, 2014 at 3:28
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    $\begingroup$ In manufacturing yes, because you won't be `serving' the methanol. But food grade methanol is by no means meant for direct consumption $\endgroup$
    – Michiel
    Nov 7, 2014 at 4:45

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