Sustainable waste recycling with coffee balls

1. What is composting and why is it so important for the environment?

In the past, green waste was sent to large landfill sites and the nutrients it contained could no longer be used. Composting garden waste or green waste, on the other hand, allows the nutrients to be collected and reintroduced into the soil. As compost contains a wide range of nutrients, it encourages the soil to produce humus. This makes it possible to do without artificial fertilisers in part.

2. What are the specific environmental benefits of composting?

Adding compost enhances the soil. The use of compost is only reflected after a few years, which is why it should be used over the long term.

3. What materials can be composted?

Examples include garden waste and peeling waste. Food leftovers can also be composted. Coffee in particular is attractive: in the past, the capsules were simply thrown away, but nowadays you can get nutrients from them, provided the packaging is compostable. Coffee balls are particularly attractive because they have no packaging at all and the coffee decomposes immediately.

4. What makes good compost?

First and foremost, the diversity of biological waste. Compost works like our stomachs: if we only eat one thing, our stomachs can't cope and rebel. That's why we eat a variety of foods. It's the same with compost: grass clippings aren't enough - the more varied the input, the better.

5. Can you explain the main differences in the composting process between a paper capsule and a coffee ball?

For private use, both lend themselves well to composting. As balls contain no packaging and decompose immediately after use, they compost more quickly. However, for us companies, there's one big difference when it comes to composting: paper caps are visually indistinguishable from aluminium caps. As many people make mistakes when disposing of waste, and we receive both paper and aluminium capsules, we have to sort the two before composting, because we can't take any chances - the aluminium would be a foreign body that wouldn't compost. That's why we can only use coffee balls from CoffeeB for our compost.

6. What do you think is the main advantage of coffee balls when it comes to composting?

It's the visual difference from other coffee capsules. For reasons of time, we have to concentrate on the visual aspect when sorting, and the quickly recognisable coffee ball helps us considerably.

7. How do the composting times for paper capsules and coffee balls differ, and what factors contribute to these differences?

There are no exact tests on this subject. Coffee balls disintegrate immediately after use, which is why they can be composted more quickly than paper capsules. But, as we've said, good compost is always the result of mixing different types of waste. That's why the composting time doesn't fundamentally change whether you use coffee balls or paper capsules.

Answers: Fabian Wurz, Hufschmid Grüngutverwertung GmbH