by Peggy Robin
Every morning I make one cup of coffee in a single-cup Keurig coffeemaker. I like the perfect consistency of the coffee that comes from a sealed, pre-measured pod, using the same amount of water each time. Never too strong or too watery.
In previous decades, I made coffee with a French press, a Mr. Coffee machine, a single drip pour-over device, and probably a half dozen other types of coffee makers from past brewing eras....but I've settled on K-cups and I'm sticking with them.
There's one and only one downside that I can see: they're environmentally irresponsible. Every time I make a cup of coffee, I'm throwing away a bit of plastic that the earth could -- and should -- do without.
I do cut off the foil top, throw it away, and scoop all the wet grounds into my compost bucket. But then I toss that plastic K-cup a trash can, and it ends up in a landfill, leaching toxic chemicals into the earth. forever more. And I do feel guilty about that.
So the last time I ordered K-cups, I went for these:
San Francisco Bay Compostable Coffee Pods - Variety Pack Dark Roast (80 Ct) K Cup Compatible including Keurig 2.0, French, Espresso, Fog, Extra Dark Italian
You can see that the coffee is encased in a paper mesh filtering bowl. I guessed (correctly) that the top is some sort of coated paper, and when torn off, it is too small to go in the big recycling bin -- so that part still needs to be thrown away.
But now we come to the part where I was fooled. The pod has a rigid ring. I just assumed it would be made of bamboo or some kind of stiff but recyclable material like a modified cardboard....but it seems I assumed too much. The problem was my lack of understanding of that bit of verbiage printed on the box that said: "Certified Commercially Compostable". There's an explanation of what that means -- but I needed to go to the company's FAQ page to find it:
What does “commercially compostable” mean?
Commercially compostable products require a commercial/industrial composting facility for breakdown, whereas home compostable products will appropriately degrade in your home compost pile.
Commercially compostable products require a commercial/industrial composting facility for breakdown, whereas home compostable products will appropriately degrade in your home compost pile.
Unfortunately, I did so only after receiving my purchase. And now I find myself every morning taking on the annoying little task of separating the used grounds in the paper mesh pouch from the plant-based-but-not-residentially-compostable plastic ring, which still has to go in the trash -- as does the coated paper top.
Not only that, but because the coffee is enclosed in a paper pouch, it's not in an air-tight container and so does not have a long storage life before begins to lose flavor. To take advantage of a discount for buying more than one, I bought 3 boxes. Oh, am I sorry now!
And yet I still hold out hope for becoming a more environmentally responsible coffee consumer. The company holds out a tantalizing prospect: residentially-compostable k-cup rings are just around the corner. Here's what they tell you:
Are your pods home compostable?
Our pods our BPI® certified commercially compostable, which means they can be composted at an industrial composting facility. However, we are actively working on our home compostable certification, so stay tuned!
Well, now that I've got myself a 3-pack of 80 pods per pack, I've got almost 8 months to wait until I go looking for K-cups again. Will this company be offering home-compostable K-cups by then? I'll tell you if and when that happens, so stay tuned! (But don't hold your breath!)
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Still Life with Robin is published on the Cleveland Park Listserv and on All Life Is Local on Saturdays.
