With the hot summer weather, there is a questions as to whether you should put your essential oils in the fridge to avoid oxidisation.
All essential oils will eventually succumb oxidisation. Oxidisation is the chemical reaction that occurs when essential oils mix with air (oxygen). This process is a slow process, but factors such as heat and light can speed this up. So the question is, should you store your essential oils in the fridge?
Before we can answer that we need answer three questions:
What is an essential oil?
How hot is it going to get?
What will the effect will this heat have on the essential oil?
Essential oils are chemical compounds extracted from plants. Each plant has a different chemical compound, therefore, different oils can be used to treat different conditions. There are various factors that can have an effect on these chemicals, which include heat and light.
Essential oils oxidise when exposed to air. Heat and light can speed up the oxidisation process. Oxidation affects the therapeutic effects of essential oils, this means it is changing the chemical structure. For example it can cause the antibacterial effects of a certain oils to be diminished. It can also cause irritation, so we really do not want to be using essential oils that have oxidised.
Generally, in the UK, the climate isn’t hot enough to worry about this. As long as you are storing your oils in a cool, dark place, they should be okay. However, I remember one particularly hot summer a few years ago (I think the temperature was near 40’C) and I regretted not storing my oils in the fridge. This hot weather had clearly had an effect on my essential oils.
I knew the effect this was having, as to start with they smelt really strong. I always love that ‘whiff’ you get when you open the lid or drawer to your oils, but this was really potent. It seemed that my expensive oils, like Jasmine, had really been affected. I also noticed that some of the oils had changed colour or consistency. The oxidation process had been accelerated by the heat. This meant that the chemical make up of the oils was changing and I could no longer trust they were safe.
Essential oils are expensive, I did not want to waste them so I used them around the house. I diffused the ones that I thought still smelt okay (some of them had gone rancid and the smell was no longer pleasant). Others I used in cleaning solutions, like lemon to clean the kitchen. Unfortunately, some did go in the bin.
So, generally, I would argue that you do not need to keep your essential oils in the fridge, however, a lesson has been learnt, and in the hot summer months I do put them in the fridge. Tisserand (2013) is also an advocate for eeping essential oils in the fridge in order to extent their shelf life, so if you are unlikely to use your bottle of oil up in 12 months, it could be worth considering.
Just to note, there some carrier oils can oxidise too, so we need to think about how these are also stored.
Remember:
Keep the lids on tight and store your oils in a cool dark place.
For more information on prolonging the life of your essential oils see Tisserand, R. (2013). Lemon on the rocks: keep your essential oils cool. https://roberttisserand.com/…/lemon-on-the-rockskeep…/ [Accessed 10th August 2024]
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