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compostable coffee capsules: an eco-option?

by Marcela Rodrigues de Magalhães

Coffee capsules have become more popular over time as a very convenient way of serving a single cup of coffee, being part of people’s home and business routines. Although, this convenience produces waste that is too complex to be completely recycled, the logistics for this reverse logistics is problematic, as was shown in this study conducted by GEPRS.

Some companies saw those issues as an opportunity for business. First, they developed coffee capsules that are partially composed of recycled or biodegradable materials, although the materials still challenging to recycle. Now, brands are releasing a compostable capsule, that could go in the organic bin, among food leftovers, or other compost piles. In the US, those capsules must be certified by the Biodegradable Products Institute (BPI) to be used in the market. In general, the difference of biodegradable and compostable relies on the fact that compostable materials will improve the quality of the soil in nutrients and it and usually breaks down quicker than biodegradable materials (although both can be disintegrated with time).

Although the compostable capsules might attract pro-environmental-responsible consumers, there are some challenges to be addressed. For example, the infrastructure needed to collect and compost the capsules, since it depends on the region collecting system. Also, the composting materials are usually more expensive than regular ones, and that price difference will not be passed to the consumer, if the company wants to remain competitive, according to Rhodes Yepsen, executive director of BPI. But it still produces a less complex waste that, even if it is directed to landfills, might provide less impact compared to the currently used coffee capsules.

Source

Moodie, A. (2016). Guilt-free coffee pods? Meet the 100% compostable answer to your caffeine fix. The Guardian, Sustainable Business.

the environmental status trap

by Murilo Urssi Malek-Zadeh

It is very common the presence of the discourse that we need to practice some pro-environmental activities: to recycle, to use biodegradable products, to consume organic food, etc. These behaviours are significant for the construction of a more sustainable world as they are well seen by the society. However, when these behaviours are practised without a critical understanding, it is dangerous because this behaviour may induce bad habits.

The “critical understanding” means the understanding of the environmental benefits that those green activities cause and, also, the understanding of some conceptual knowledge, for instance, that is better a small consumption than a large one, even for green products. It is hard to support this way of thinking because there is a mismatch between the social reward for ecological consumption and the real environmental impact of this consumption.

The social reward is more significant for a high consumption than for the ecological one (BROOKS & WILSON, 2015), what induces people to consume more, even for the environmental friendly consumption. Therefore, the practice of consuming a lot of green products allied with another ecological activity may lead to a double social reward: from the large consumption and the eco-friendly practices.

For instance, in a study realized by Van Der Wal et al. (2016), was showed that for the status received for shopping in an environmental friendly market, the consumers use 10 times more bags with its logo printed than it would be used in conventional markets and, that behavior was caused by the social status associated with the eco-friendly logo.

The environmental status trap is: while society rewards some pro-environmental behaviour, some anti-environmental ones are neutral (and sometimes positive) for the judging eyes of the society. The individual environmental impact develops in a different logic that the individual social reward.

For this reason, it is necessary that the individual behaviour be close to an environmental understanding than to an illegitimate social reward. To try to understand the real meaning of the act is a better way for an individual thinks itself, in comparison with a check-list of “what to do”society gives that. Those checklists are useful sometimes, in times of doubt, for instance, but, they can encourage the creation of taboos that becomes hard to break when the time of new behaviours needs arise.

Sources

BROOKS, J. S.; WILSON, C. The influence of contextual cues on the perceived status of consumption-reducing behaviour. Ecological Economics, v. 117, p. 108-117, 2015.

VAN DER WAL, A.J. et al. The paradox of ‘green to be seen’: Green high-status shoppers excessively use (branded) shopping bags. International Journal of Research in Marketing, v. 33, n. 1, p. 216-219, 2016.

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