Getting Canny With Capsule Coffee
If you’ve made a New Year resolution to live a more healthy and environmentally friendly lifestyle, you may already have begun asking a few questions now that your initial enthusiasm had perhaps waned a little. For example: just how is your favourite cup of decaf’ actually decaffeinated? And while you’re pondering that, have you ever considered how long it takes that individual coffee capsule to biodegrade?
The answers might not be as reassuring as you’d like.
Many brands use paint-stripper chemicals to extract the caffeine from coffee beans, with a reported 80% of decaf coffees on the market having undergone such a process. Added to that, aluminium and plastic capsules can take 200 to 500 years to degrade in landfill - and the bad news is made worse by the fact that there are 52 billion non-recyclable plastic coffee pods being produced globally each year.
This article is not paid-for-content on this site, by the way, because we’ve yet to make any part of it commercial - perhaps that will come as and when the site grows and requires some investment…. BUT, many people will have wondered about the throw-away waste and the environmental hit when it comes to pod-style coffee making machines.
So you can imagine the reaction when we were recently told about a Devon based company has come up with an eco-friendly decaffeinated answer for coffee lovers seeking a caffeine detox…
Blue Goose offers four coffees in its compostable capsule range for Nespresso® ‘original drop-through’ pod machines including the company’s Swiss Water Decaf pod.
Used capsules can then be placed in council food waste collection bins and will turn into compost or liquid fertiliser within 12 weeks, depending on local waste processing facilities. Blue Goose also work with waste processor First Mile for those who don’t yet have local council food waste collections.
Added to that, the Swiss Water Decaf pod contains organic, single-origin coffee that is also vegetarian and vegan approved. Unlike the reported 80 per cent of decaffeinated coffees on the market that undergo a decaffeination process that uses the same chemicals found in paint stripper, the Swiss Water process combines spring water, temperature and time to create an exceptional tasting coffee without the caffeine kick or chemical trail.
“We wanted to prove just how good capsule coffee - and in particular decaf capsule coffee - should taste without compromising on our ethical approach to business,” says Blue Goose co-founder, Lex Thornely. “So we naturally selected speciality grade and Organic Swiss Water decaf coffee to go into our eco pods, for which we pay our growers a premium beyond the Fairtrade minimum price.”
“Our customers therefore get the very best tasting ethical decaf experience while our farmers earn a greater income to help ensure their families, workers and local communities thrive long into the future.”
The whole Blue Goose Eco Pod range offers a sustainable alternative to aluminium and plastic capsules. Nespresso states that just 28 per cent of its capsules are recycled in the UK, meaning billions go to landfill or incinerators.
“Single use coffee machines are all about convenience, but every capsule coffee brewed at home creates a damaging environmental legacy that, as yet, has largely gone under the radar of consumers and governments alike,” says Lex.
“This was the inspiration for Nick and I to create a coffee capsule experience without the conscience, where our certified plastic-free and GM-free wood bark capsules are produced using renewable energy and waste wood bark from the European paper industry.
“Our whole range is also packaged in sustainably sourced, recyclable FSC cardboard, printed using vegetable inks and secured using plastic-free glue,” he added.
“So not only does our Swiss Water Decaf coffee minimise the production and use of man-made industrial chemicals, but our whole eco capsule range represents a delicious, sustainable and ethical coffee experience that is good for our customers and our planet.
“It’s the ultimate coffee convenience without the conscience for anyone looking for a caffeine-free start to 2020.”
