BY: ALEXANDRIA LEE
Now you can use coffee to keep both yourself and your home warm and thriving during these cold winter months.
A 24-year-old entrepreneur has invented a way to use waste coffee grounds as biofuel. Arthur Kay is the founder and CEO of Bio-bean, a London-based company that collects thousands of tonnes of coffee waste and compresses it into pellets that can be used to heat buildings. The biochemical process involves first sifting and drying the grounds to eliminate moisture. The material is then passed through mechanical machinery and mixed with an organic solvent to remove existing plant oils.
Bio-bean collects thousands of tonnes of coffee waste and puts it through a biochemical process that allows the new coffee pellets to be used to heat buildings.
Kay, who was studying architecture at University College London when he came up with the idea, chose coffee for its heat-generating properties and ease of collection. “Where others see waste, bio-bean sees resources in the wrong place, demonstrating that urban structures are open to sustainable redesign,” Bio-bean’s website states.
“My real interest was initially in collection and recycling,” said Kay in the December 2015 issue of WIRED magazine. Bio-bean sources its raw material from hundreds of locations around the United Kingdom, including office blocks, cafes and instant-coffee factories. The sources provide the coffee grounds for free and are relieved of the waste-management costs they would normally incur.
Bio-bean collects and recycles their raw materials from hundreds of offices, cafes, and instant-coffee factories around the United Kingdom
“Every tonne of waste coffee grounds recycled using Bio-bean’s technology saves 6.8 tonnes of CO2 emissions,” said Kay. “It’s like driving from London to Beijing – twice.”
Bio-bean’s factory can process 50,000 tonnes of coffee grounds per year and is looking to open another plant, as 500,000 tonnes is produced annually just in the UK. “There’s nothing unique about the UK coffee market,” said Kay, who also said he is looking into expanding globally through franchises and partnerships. “There’s no reason why this thing couldn’t be done around the world.”
Every tonne of coffee ground waste recycled by Bio-bean saves 6.8 tonnes of COc2 emissions.
Kay employs 20 people and, over the course of two years, raised over two million pounds to finance Bio-bean. In addition to being the second-youngest person in his company, Kay was also chosen as the youngest person to ever to become the Guardian Sustainable Business leader of the year in 2015. “Being part of designing sustainable cities is my target,” said Kay in an interview with The Guardian. “When I reach 60-70, about three-quarters of the world will live in cities. That will be the most dramatic change certainly in my life and I want to be part of that, to make sure we design those cities efficiently and effectively.”
Along with biofuel, the company also hopes to create liquid biodiesel for vehicles.
“You can apply this technology to thousands of other waste streams, and that’s where we see growth,” said Kay.
20 people are employed under Arthur Kay, the creator of Bio-bean, who has been named the youngest Guardian Sustainable Business leader in 2015.
Image sources: dailycoffeenews.com, google.ca, wired.co.uk
