Writers block has had me sat up at my laptop for hours not knowing what to write about. Politics? Meh. Social issues? Meh. Something trending??
Meh.
I went ahead and grabbed my cup of coffee, and then it clicked. Why not write about coffee?
But what would I say?
I could write a fun facts article! Did you know that coffee’s a fruit? That New York drinks x7 more coffee than the rest of the world, or that coffee is one of the main international commodities?
All “meh”.
But then I came across something which actually caught my attention: using coffee beans as a replacement for fossil fuels?
Interesting.
Coffee Grounds as BioFuel
Recent studies suggest the utility of used coffee grounds as an alternative fuel and potential soil amendment. Coffee serves as one of the globe’s largest agricultural commodities – with a whopping 8 billion kilograms grown annually worldwide. While coffee does serve as fuel in the morning, it boasts some environmental issues. With that much coffee being produced annually throughout the globe, a lot of it simply ends up in landfills.
Something of daily use shouldn’t just be thrown out. There are companies which put their coffee grounds to use, such as Starbucks and Nestle, recycling them for the benefit of the environment, while researches believe that the oil from coffee grounds could very well contribute to the production of tens of thousands of liters of biodiesel to fuel global supply.
Claus Conzelmann, VP for health, safety, and environmental sustainability at Nestle says that the idea of using coffee for energy beyond the morning pick-me-up was “driven by the insight that coffee grounds have fairly high calorific value: their fuel value is even slightly better than wood.”
According to Conzelmann, coffee grounds fulfil 100% of the actual needs necessary at Nestles two coffee factories in China and Vietnam. The company’s reuse of coffee, which started back in 2013, was aimed to reach a goal of zero waste in 150 European factories by 2020. Incineration, the destruction of waste material (primarily by burning) has helped Nestle halve its carbon emissions per ton of product and reduce its energy use by 5%, while production has grown by more than 60%.
Research has discovered that coffee grounds are 11-20% oil by weight, around the same amount as palm oil, soybean oil, and other biodiesel feedstocks. Although it seems feasible, coffee grounds as a means for biodiesel would be more difficult to achieve as a source of fuel than we may think.
Oil in coffee is solidified, not liquified, so naturally, extractions would take extra time, effort, and money. Luckily, the oil extracted from coffee grounds meets the international standards for biodiesel fuel blends, further suggesting its applications in the biodiesel field.
Coffee Grounds as Activated Carbon?
Mingming Lu, associate professor of environmental energy at the University of Cincinnati shares that turning coffee grounds into activated carbon lights up the eyes of many researchers. Many feel excited to acknowledge that coffee grounds can be used for positive benefit rather than dumped in the trash.
We get activated carbon from coffee beans through a 2-step process:
- Hydrothermal acid hydrolosis: a process which speeds up the decomposition of amorphous parts, breaks the crystal chain, and reduces the degradation of cellulose crystals, and;
- Chemical activation of KOH at 800 degrees Celsius.
Coffee can be useful. Quite useful, actually.
Now that I’ve shared some interesting facts about coffee which span beyond just the basics, I’d like to take a second to share with you all someone who I know, a coffee master!
Masashi Harikae, known as @espresso_vancity_gogh on Instagram, is a dear friend of mine. Yeah, coffee has great benefits for the planet, but Masashi uses coffee to its most intricate extent – latte art. I’ve been following this artists work since the beginning. From cappuccinos with roses on them, to ballerinas and face portraits, Masashi’s work has made me appreciate coffee just that much more.
So, the next time you go to grab a cup of coffee, consider recycling your coffee grounds (they can also serve as fertilizer!)
Think green, keep the world clean.