{"id":18337,"date":"2015-01-15T11:45:57","date_gmt":"2015-01-15T16:45:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress-367309-1145705.cloudwaysapps.com\/?p=18337"},"modified":"2015-01-15T20:28:02","modified_gmt":"2015-01-16T01:28:02","slug":"single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/","title":{"rendered":"The Single Serve Coffee Waste Monster [Video]"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>When I first came across a single-serve coffee maker a number of years ago, I thought it had to be a greener option than standard drip coffee makers: no <a href=\"http:\/\/craftingagreenworld.com\/2014\/04\/11\/spotted-biodegradable-plant-pots-coffee-grounds\/\">wasted coffee<\/a> or water, no energy used to keep the coffee hot, no paper filters. But I quickly saw the waste generated for the plastic and aluminum pods.But it can&#8217;t be that much, right?<\/p>\n<p>The video above attempts to create a picture of the waste created by K-Cups and other disposable coffee pods. Yes, it is that much: last year, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.motherjones.com\/blue-marble\/2014\/03\/coffee-k-cups-green-mountain-polystyrene-plastic\"><em>Mother Jones<\/em><\/a> noted that all of the K-Cups produced\u00a0in 2013 &#8211; 8.3 billion &#8211; would wrap around the Earth&#8217;s equator 10.5 times. And that&#8217;s just one brand of single serve coffee pods&#8230; Overall, these little plastic and aluminum pods create around <a href=\"http:\/\/www.eastbayexpress.com\/oakland\/waste-the-dark-side-of-the-new-coffee-craze\/Content?oid=3687220\">966 million pounds of solid waste<\/a> every year.<\/p>\n<p>As <a href=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/2014\/12\/canadians-can-now-recycle-single-serve-coffee-pods-price\/\">we&#8217;ve noted before<\/a>, recycling these pods as they&#8217;re currently made is difficult. Single serve heavyweight Keurig makes a handful &#8211; 5% &#8211; of its K-Cups out of recycled plastic, and is aiming for full recyclability by 2020. Other companies are jumping ahead on this front with recyclable or compostable options. But, at this point, we&#8217;re still talking about a lot of landfill space going to coffee pods&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>Again, I think single serve coffee has the potential to be much more resource efficient than our usual methods of brewing the stuff&#8230; but the trash issue has to be handled. I&#8217;m of the mind that refillable, reusable pods are the answer &#8211; they&#8217;re also much cheaper &#8211; but, from what I read, that cuts down on the convenience factor (which I have trouble understanding&#8230; how much less convenient is it?). Compostable options also seem like a good idea &#8211; just toss the whole thing into the compost bin rather than the trash. Of course, I&#8217;m not taking lifecycle into account here &#8211; those metrics may make this whole argument moot.<\/p>\n<p>If you&#8217;re concerned about the amount of waste generated by this craze, consider signing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.change.org\/p\/brian-kelley-keurig-must-make-universally-recyclable-k-cup-coffee-pods-now-not-by-2020\">the petition<\/a> created by &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.killthekcup.org\/\">Kill the K-Cup<\/a>&#8221; (which is run by <a href=\"http:\/\/socialbean.ca\/\">another coffee company<\/a>, and which also gave some love to our last post on single serve coffee waste). And, if you&#8217;ve got ideas for dealing with this issue, share them with us&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>via <a href=\"http:\/\/www.straight.com\/blogra\/804996\/kill-k-cup-video-illustrates-horrors-coffee-pod-waste\">Straight.com<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/container.recycling\/posts\/10152730817498883\">Container Recycling Institute at Facebook<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Single serve coffee makers are convenient, and have green elements&#8230; but the amount of trash generated is staggering&#8230; even monstrous!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56,"featured_media":18338,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"video","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,2,79],"tags":[1817,7699,7592,7701,7702,3709,39,7700,48],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Giant Waste Footprint Of Single Serve Coffee<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Single serve coffee makers are convenient, and have green elements... but the amount of trash generated is staggering... even monstrous!\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Giant Waste Footprint Of Single Serve Coffee\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Single serve coffee makers are convenient, and have green elements... but the amount of trash generated is staggering... even monstrous!\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Sustainablog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-01-15T16:45:57+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2015-01-16T01:28:02+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/single-serve-coffee-pod-monster.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"640\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"391\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9b578e764fdaeb0c31f2d565d3f02b30\"},\"headline\":\"The Single Serve Coffee Waste Monster [Video]\",\"datePublished\":\"2015-01-15T16:45:57+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2015-01-16T01:28:02+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/\"},\"wordCount\":386,\"commentCount\":5,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"composting\",\"k-cups\",\"keurig\",\"kill the k-cup\",\"mother jones\",\"petition\",\"Recycling\",\"single serve coffee\",\"waste\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Living\",\"Media\",\"Products\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/\",\"name\":\"The Giant Waste Footprint Of Single Serve Coffee\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2015-01-15T16:45:57+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2015-01-16T01:28:02+00:00\",\"description\":\"Single serve coffee makers are convenient, and have green elements... but the amount of trash generated is staggering... even monstrous!\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"The Single Serve Coffee Waste Monster [Video]\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/\",\"name\":\"Sustainablog\",\"description\":\"Since 2003, Sustainablog has been one of the pioneers of sustainability news online.\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Sustainablog\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/cropped-sblog-logo_3b.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/cropped-sblog-logo_3b.jpg\",\"width\":200,\"height\":142,\"caption\":\"Sustainablog\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"}},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9b578e764fdaeb0c31f2d565d3f02b30\",\"name\":\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/36b723ef9244464afe2e59d68b238a07?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/36b723ef9244464afe2e59d68b238a07?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\"},\"description\":\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg is the founder and editor of sustainablog. You can keep up with all of his writing at Facebook, and at Google+\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/author\/jeffmcintirestrasburg\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Giant Waste Footprint Of Single Serve Coffee","description":"Single serve coffee makers are convenient, and have green elements... but the amount of trash generated is staggering... even monstrous!","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Giant Waste Footprint Of Single Serve Coffee","og_description":"Single serve coffee makers are convenient, and have green elements... but the amount of trash generated is staggering... even monstrous!","og_url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/","og_site_name":"Sustainablog","article_published_time":"2015-01-15T16:45:57+00:00","article_modified_time":"2015-01-16T01:28:02+00:00","og_image":[{"width":640,"height":391,"url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/single-serve-coffee-pod-monster.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/"},"author":{"name":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9b578e764fdaeb0c31f2d565d3f02b30"},"headline":"The Single Serve Coffee Waste Monster [Video]","datePublished":"2015-01-15T16:45:57+00:00","dateModified":"2015-01-16T01:28:02+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/"},"wordCount":386,"commentCount":5,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization"},"keywords":["composting","k-cups","keurig","kill the k-cup","mother jones","petition","Recycling","single serve coffee","waste"],"articleSection":["Living","Media","Products"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/","url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/","name":"The Giant Waste Footprint Of Single Serve Coffee","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#website"},"datePublished":"2015-01-15T16:45:57+00:00","dateModified":"2015-01-16T01:28:02+00:00","description":"Single serve coffee makers are convenient, and have green elements... but the amount of trash generated is staggering... even monstrous!","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/single-serve-coffee-waste-monster-video\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Single Serve Coffee Waste Monster [Video]"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#website","url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/","name":"Sustainablog","description":"Since 2003, Sustainablog has been one of the pioneers of sustainability news online.","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#organization","name":"Sustainablog","url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/cropped-sblog-logo_3b.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/cropped-sblog-logo_3b.jpg","width":200,"height":142,"caption":"Sustainablog"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9b578e764fdaeb0c31f2d565d3f02b30","name":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/36b723ef9244464afe2e59d68b238a07?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/36b723ef9244464afe2e59d68b238a07?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg"},"description":"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg is the founder and editor of sustainablog. You can keep up with all of his writing at Facebook, and at Google+","sameAs":["https:\/\/sustainablog.org"],"url":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/author\/jeffmcintirestrasburg\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18337"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/56"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18337"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18337\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}