Your Keurig Espresso Pods Are By no means Getting Recycled

There’s a Keurig machine in some 40 million households in the U.S. Single-serve espresso brewing methods — which permit shoppers to make only one cup of espresso at a time by feeding a pod right into a slot and urgent a button — have soared in reputation because the early 2000s.

Inevitably, this results in quite a lot of trash.

Each cup of java brewed creates a conundrum: what to do with the espresso pod that produced it. To start out, can it’s recycled? The reply, in Keurig’s case, is just not actually. The corporate’s single-use espresso pods — often known as Ok-cups — are manufactured from polypropylene plastic, a cloth that experts warn is not as recyclable as shoppers have been led to suppose. Two of the nation’s largest recycling firms have stated they don’t settle for Ok-cup pods, and one environmental group calculated that for those who lined up all of the Ok-cup pods on this planet’s landfills facet by facet, they would comfortably circle the globe 10 times.

A brand new espresso pod firm claims to have developed an answer to Keurig’s plastic waste downside. Cambio Roasters, which launched in September, provides a Keurig-compatible espresso pod that’s made out of aluminum — which, not like plastic, is infinitely recyclable. Cambio is led by a workforce of former Keurig workers, together with founder and CEO Kevin Hartley, who was beforehand a chief innovation officer at Keurig Inexperienced Mountain, as the corporate was previously identified. “That is, in our view, essentially the most thrilling innovation in espresso because the Ok-cup,” stated Hartley throughout a launch-day press name for Cambio.

Specialists, nonetheless, aren’t certain that Cambio understands simply how massive of an issue Ok-cups pose to curbside recycling methods.

“Actually, plastic is simply not choice,” stated Jeremy Pare, a visiting professor of enterprise and setting at Duke College’s Nicholas Faculty of the Setting. However even aluminum, with all its advantages, is “nonetheless going to have points.”

A part of the problem of making a very recyclable packaging choice — for nearly any shopper good — is the severely fragmented nature of the American recycling panorama. “There are over 10,000 recycling methods within the U.S.,” stated Pare, who can be a member of the Plastic Air pollution Working Group at Duke’s Nicholas Institute for Power, Setting, and Sustainability. “And but, on the similar time, solely 1 / 4 of the inhabitants has entry to recycling within the U.S.” (Pare lives in a single such group with no formal recycling program, simply outdoors of Augusta, Maine.) Within the U.S., the query of whether or not one thing is recyclable can solely precisely be answered on an area stage.

One other downside is the plastic composition of most Ok-cup pods. Sustainability considerations have adopted the Keurig model carefully because it has scaled. (As soon as a small startup, Keurig was acquired by Inexperienced Mountain Espresso Roasters in 2006; in 2018, Keurig Inexperienced Mountain merged with Dr Pepper Snapple to grow to be Keurig Dr Pepper.) Keurig began promoting Ok-cups pods made of polypropylene in 2016, with the objective of making 100 percent of K-cup pods “recyclable” by 2020. However the firm has run into bother for touting recyclability. In 2018, a California resident sued Keurig for claiming that Ok-cup pods could possibly be recycled after the foil lid was eliminated and the espresso grounds had been rinsed or dumped out — which resulted in Keurig agreeing to pay $10 million in a class-action settlement. And in September of this yr, the Securities and Change Fee charged Keurig for falsely claiming the pods “can be effectively recycled.” (Keurig settled the declare by agreeing to pay a $1.5 million penalty price.)

Hartley, who left Keurig in 2017, knew shoppers needed a plastic-free Ok-cup choice — and after years of prototypes and testing, he and his workforce settled on aluminum as an easier-to-recycle different. Aluminum can be impervious to oxygen, which causes espresso to lose its taste over time. “At any time when we brew a cup of espresso, it tastes precisely because the roastmaster meant,” stated Hartley.

Cambio isn’t the primary single-serve espresso firm to decide to ditch plastic or put money into circularity. Nespresso, a preferred single-serve espresso firm that’s owned by the Nestlé Group, has made its capsules out of aluminum for over 30 years. In 2020, Nespresso introduced that its pods can be manufactured from 80 percent recycled aluminum, and it claims its international recycling fee is 32 percent.

However Nespresso pods solely work in Nespresso machines. As a result of Cambio espresso pods are designed to work with Keurig fashions, Hartley hopes to offer shoppers what they need “with out having to purchase a brand new brewer.”

Cambio additionally permits customers to peel again the lid and dump out the grounds earlier than recycling. Nespresso pod lids are difficult to remove, and the corporate instructs customers to recycle their pods as is, grounds and all — however they’re solely authorised for curbside recycling in New York City and Jersey City, the place a delegated recycling contractor cleans them out earlier than reprocessing them. (Nespresso shoppers can even mail used pods again to the producer for recycling, or drop them off at Nespresso shops.)

Sadly, swapping plastic for aluminum doesn’t mechanically resolve Ok-cup pods’ recyclability disaster, specialists say. What actually prevents espresso pods, no matter what they’re manufactured from, from having a second life is their measurement.

After assortment, recyclables are sorted at a facility generally known as a supplies restoration facility, or MRF. MRFs aren’t outfitted to gather small objects — a standard rule of thumb is that they will’t deal with something smaller than a credit card — and so small objects positioned in recycling bins usually wind up getting despatched to landfills. “The Ok-cups are so small that they fall by way of” the equipment in lots of recycling services, stated Pare. “So apart from separating” espresso pods from the waste stream “individually, there’s no good technique to recycle them.”

Cambio’s method to working round that is two-pronged. First, the corporate says it desires shoppers to stack used Ok-cup pods collectively — after which pinch them closed — to beat many recycling services’ measurement necessities. Three or extra used Ok-cup pods ought to create a bit of aluminum giant sufficient to suit by way of the equipment at recycling services, says Hartley. (These directions don’t presently seem on Cambio’s packaging or web site.)

Cambio says additionally it is creating a tool that may make this stacking and pinching of used Ok-cups simpler. “Consider this gadget as a straightforward means for shoppers to bundle cups collectively after which toss into their recycling bin,” stated Hartley. He added that the corporate has filed for patents for second-generation Cambio pods that may be “snapped” collectively after use.

Jan Dell, a chemical engineer and an environmental nonprofit founder, stated, “I don’t suppose aluminum pods are a significant enchancment,” citing their small measurement as a barrier to being accepted and sorted through curbside recycling methods. “Consider the pods like confetti: inconceivable to gather again up.”

Cambio disagreed with Dell’s characterization of the swap to aluminum, mentioning that presently, primarily no single-use plastic pods are recycled, whereas aluminum might be endlessly recycled. “To Cambio and shoppers, these two details are significant.” Hartley additionally shared that the work of making certain Cambio’s compatibility with recycling applications throughout the nation is “ongoing.” The corporate is planning to run exams with MRFs in particular markets “as quickly as possible.”

In response to a request for remark, a spokesperson from Keurig Dr Pepper stated, “We all know our shoppers need simplicity and fewer waste.” They shared that the corporate has “been lightweighting our pods to scale back the quantity of plastic used,” in addition to “growing choices for recycling them,” together with a soon-to-be-launched program during which prospects will be capable to mail their used pods to Keurig for recycling. The spokesperson additionally stated the corporate is “regularly exploring” extra “sustainable packaging” choices.

Dell leads the nonprofit The Final Seaside Cleanup, which is concentrated on preventing plastic air pollution. The last word answer to Keurig’s plastic footprint, she stated, is a product that eliminates “the necessity to acquire something again from prospects,” like a fiber-based pod that may be composted together with the grounds.

Keurig is presently testing a plant-based pod format that gained’t have any plastic or aluminum, and the corporate expects it to be licensed compostable, in accordance with the Keurig Dr Pepper spokesperson. Hartley stated he labored on that product for a few years, calling it “a tremendous innovation.”

However these espresso pucks, which aren’t but out there on the market, will require an entirely new machine to run. “It’s going to take a very long time earlier than America goes to throw away 40 or 50 million brewers and purchase 40 or 50 million new brewers,” stated Hartley. He added, referring to his time with Keurig, “I gained’t inform publicly how a lot cash we spent to start out from zero and have 50 million American households loving their Keurigs. Nevertheless it’s an enormous elevate, and it takes many years.”

In an interview with the Atlantic in 2015, the inventor of the K-cup stated, “I really feel unhealthy generally that I ever did it.” As the marketplace for single-serve coffee brewers grows, so will its impression on the setting, except its merchandise are one way or the other wildly reimagined and redesigned. Keurigs and Nespresso machines are marketed as each handy and splendid, a mix that’s prone to hold drawing in new market segments.

However eco-conscious espresso brewers can relaxation simple within the information that you simply don’t want a Keurig or Nespresso machine to brew one cup of espresso at a time; any espresso maker might be single-serve for those who use solely the water and occasional grounds you really need. No pods required — possibly only a filter.

This text initially appeared in Grist at https://grist.org/food-and-agriculture/why-its-so-hard-to-create-a-truly-recyclable-keurig-coffee-pod/. Grist is a nonprofit, unbiased media group devoted to telling tales of local weather options and a simply future. Be taught extra at Grist.org.