Is the Cup to Blame?
A coffee cup is undoubtedly a take-away packaging poster child. First to be blamed for the mountains of waste (estimated up to 5 billion disposable cups per year in the UK1), first to be replaced with “green” and greener alternatives – compostables, edibles, bio-based. And first in line to be trailed for the reusable and returnable alternatives (the way to go!).
But is it where our mind plays tricks on us, because it’s coffee? What do the numbers actually say?
A recent study looking into the whole life cycle of the cup of coffee showed that the total hot latte carbon footprint is 0.64 kg CO2 eq per cup, and as we are in the summer, your iced latte would be 0.86 kg CO2 eq per cup. The impact of packaging, such as single-use paper cup for hot latte, contributes to just 4% or less of this. It is higher for a single-use plastic cup for an iced latte ( under 27%) due to the higher impact of virgin fossil-based material extraction and EOL. The total impact of an iced latte can be mitigated and go down to 0.26 from 0.86 kg CO2 eq per cup (almost 70% reduction) in the scenario using oat milk and an oat cup instead of dairy milk and a plastic cup.
Reducing carbon footprint of typical coffee consumption from the whole lifecycle viewpoint.
Reusable cups keep scoring better than single-use, with the results for climate change ranging from 0.004 kgCO2 for reusables to 0.1 kg CO2 eq for edibles with Choco flavour. However, edible cups work wonders if they are actually eaten as a snack!
A tasty solution to packaging waste? Life cycle assessment of edible coffee cups.
Coffee and its packaging are not unique here – a study that analysed 30 different product/plastic packaging combinations showed that:
“For most of the 13 environmental indicators reported, plastic packaging is responsible for less than 10% of total life cycle emissions of 23 out of the 30 foods studied. Relative packaging emissions tend to be higher for liquids and food products packaged in small quantities, although the absolute values of energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are small.”
Environmental impacts of plastic packaging of food products – ScienceDirect
LCA helps us identify hotspots where the changes we are planning to make will have the most impact, either as individuals (does a reusable cup justify this second or third cup of coffee?) or as a business!
You can find all these studies and more covering textiles, automotive, medical and packaging sectors, as well as the end-of-life process at RECOUP and the BPF Plastic LCA Library https://plasticslcalibrary.co.uk
For all these times when you need to back up your words and decisions with solid numbers!