Coffee as Biofuel: Good to the Last Drop

Posted on December 23, 2008 by John Platt in News+Opinion

Ah, that first cup of coffee in the morning. It really gets you moving. And soon, it could get your car moving, too.

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According to research from the Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering at the University of Nevada, used coffee grounds could be a near-endless and extremely profitable source of biofuels. Not only do the grounds themselves contain a huge amount of oil, the grounds still have use after the oil has been extracted. The dried grounds can become fuel pellets for stoves, or be used as compost, meaning the process leaves almost no waste behind.

Another bonus: the antioxidants in coffee would help to prevent the coffee-based biofuels from going rancid. (That’s not something you read about very often in discussions of biofuels — they have a shelf life. In this case, the coffee biofuel was “found to be stable for more than 1 month under ambient conditions.”)

Now, we make a lot of coffee in our household, but think of the impact of a big chain like Starbucks. According to the scientists behind this research, Starbucks alone generates (annually) 210 million pounds of spent coffee grounds, which could then become 2.92 million gallons of biodiesel and 89,000 tons of fuel pellets. Now too shabby.

The research, “Spent Coffee Grounds as a Versatile Source of Green Energy” by Narasimharao Kondamudi, Susanta K. Mohapatra and Mano Misra, appears in the Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry.

Tags:

alternative energy, alternative fuel, bio-diesel, biodiesel, biofuel, coffee, coffee grounds, energy

7 Responses to “ Coffee as Biofuel: Good to the Last Drop ”

Qing

24. Dec, 2008

don’t tell me how good this is.
tell me where to collect.

i had been collecting coffee waste for years and i had listen to this bio-fuel thing for ages also.

WHERE SHOULD I DONATE MY COFFEE WASTE~~!!

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john

24. Dec, 2008

Appreciate your POV, OING. But this is cutting-edge stuff, not quite ready for anyone to take advantage of. Soon, maybe, but not yet.

Until then, why not try composting? Either for yourself, or set up a community compost area. All of our coffee grounds go into a worm farm in our garage, where they become wonderful fertilizer.

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Qing

06. Jan, 2009

sorry i didnt’ tell you i am in HK, that not much land can do vegitation, not even mention fertilizer….

at the moment i turn my coffee waste grounds into body scrub by adding grape-seed-oil and salt, as gift to my friends…

still feeling too luxury as a guilt….

still, i am really looking forward to this bio-fuel thing….

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Qing

06. Jan, 2009

ahhh right~! you did mention this university of nevada is handling the research~ may be we should send them an email or even more crazy, to send them a parcel of used coffee grounds to support them~!

(yes i know… the parcel thing is too crazy… i just mention for fun….+___+)

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Hielscher Ultrasonics

18. May, 2009

This is certainly a very interesting feedstock, as this does not compete with food for land. Neither does it require additional resources because it is wast anyway. However the collection and trucking to central processing plants my spoil the overall carbon footprint a bit. There is a big advantage, if you grow coffee, and make biodiesel at the same spot, such as in brazil.

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