Once we brew ourselves a cup of espresso, based on Kaffe Bueno, we utilise a mere 1% of the vitamins discovered within the espresso’s biomass. Once we throw away the espresso grounds, the vitamin rots away, depriving us of useful fat, proteins, antioxidants and different vitamins, and releasing carbon dioxide and methane whereas it’s at it.
Kaffe Bueno, with its new biorefinery in Rødovre, goals to cease this from occurring, turning the wasted espresso grounds into meals and beauty merchandise for consumption and thereby stopping emissions.
The biorefinery, which has €2.5 million backing from the European Innovation Council, can upcycle 500 tons of espresso grounds every year.
“Among the meals elements in our portfolio embrace prebiotic fibre (soluble and insoluble), antioxidants, clean-label caramel colors, structured fat/emulsifiers, and an encapsulation agent for bioactives and probiotics,” Juan Pablo Medina, Kaffe Bueno’s CEO and Co-Founder, informed FoodNavigator.
Lowering emissions
In addition to creating merchandise, the biorefinery additionally works to forestall the emissions that may have come from the espresso grounds had they not been upcycled. One of many greenhouse gasses espresso grounds often emits is methane, which is 25 instances stronger than CO2.
“We stop this from occurring,” Medina informed us, “On this biorefinery, by utilizing inexperienced chemistry and biotechnology we rework this by-product into completely different inputs/elements for private care, human and animal vitamin and agriculture.”
The biorefinery can be capable of hold emissions low in different methods. “The great thing about our resolution is that not solely can we scale back the emissions related to espresso disposal however most significantly those related to the elements we’re changing in our buyer’s formulations.
“Because of the truth that we don’t have any further land (often farming represents the most important CO2 emissions within the worth chain) plus the modern and sustainable nature of our biorefinery processes, our elements have at the very least 80% much less emissions than present than present alternate options.”
Growth
The biorefinery, which opened in Denmark on 29 September, has the potential to broaden as much as 1,500 tons per yr of manufacturing. This isn’t the fruits of Kaffe Bueno’s efforts, however solely the start.
“Our focus proper now could be on delivering merchandise from newly opened biorefinery, nonetheless, because of the provision of spent espresso all all over the world, we’re presently additionally speaking to completely different potential companions in Germany, Netherlands, US and South America to probably set up the following biorefinery there,” Medina informed us.
“This business biorefinery can have a capability of at the very least 15,000 tons. The choice on this location will rely upon various factors and can be determined subsequent yr.”
