The great thing about coffee bags is that they are as good for the environment as they are for your caffeinated appetite. It doesn’t matter what your recycling habits are; you can still recycle these with ease and a clear environmental conscience. Irresponsibly disposing of your dirt can cause further ecological damage that everyone could do with avoiding in the first place.
Environmentalists are teaching us to take a look around ourselves for ways to recycle our waste. Although the aim is being pushed across slowly, it is still effective that we use our old junk before throwing them away is the best way to take care of our planet. Even if we are trading in our regular coffee purchases for a more environmentally friendly version, it will still do us many good to treat all waste with a little bit of caution. Here is what you can do with the different coffee bags after you are done drinking all the coffee:
Paper coffee bags
If you have gone out of your comfort zone to buy a coffee subscription finally and received your coffee grounds in a paper coffee bag, then you would be able to recycle them quickly. Once you have finished your delicious coffee, you can place your coffee bag into the compost heap. However, if your coffee bags are coated with a thin film of plastic, then you will need to dispose of them the conventional way. Even if the bag is made of paper, the plastic bag won’t be recycled in the compost. You will have to throw it in the rubbish bin.
Plastic bags
Plastics are not biodegradable and will need to be disposed of correctly unless you want to use them to double up as an additional vase or jar for more plants. The coffee grounds can be used in the mulch for your plants, and you can use the bags as small vases to plant various tiny plants. You could even attempt to grow your little coffee plant. There is no guarantee that you will be able to grow plants that you can eventually get a cup of coffee from, but you can put the bags to good ornamental use regardless.
Aluminium bags
Coffee bags that are made out of any kind of foil are multilayered, and under no circumstances can they be recycled. They can be used for potting, but they will need to be thrown away as soon as they are empty. Coffee tins also have a thin layer of plastic fused to them that cannot be taken apart from the container, avoiding any issues and just throwing it away.
Another excellent way for us to start influencing the people around us is to introduce them to a better way of living. Tiny coffee bags have only just become a trend and have proven that it is an item that everyone should try and invest in if they love coffee. The smaller bags come in a box instead of a tin or plastic bag making their packaging a great choice. They look like little tea bags for coffee, and the best part about them, aside from the taste, is that each little bag is biodegradable so that you can add it straight into your compost or mulch. It’s an affordable way to get rid of unwanted waste and still help your plants.
When you go out and have coffee at a coffee shop, you can opt for coffee shops with a high eco-friendly factor and use every opportunity to support their aim to recycle their old bags and boxes. Avoid plastics as much as you can, primarily if they are used as coffee packaging. When you order or buy a coffee subscription online, do so from companies who are keen on recycling plastics and using only biodegradable content because the UK currently has a poor recycling rate when it comes to plastic. Request that your deliveries be done with packaging that is easy to recycle, like boxes instead of plastic bags. Any effort that can be made to avoid using it will only do the surroundings well. Rome might not have been built in a day, and the quest to make the items we use environmentally friendly might take a while, but we can most certainly try one day at a time to make the necessary changes to keeping the planet a less polluted place.
Northern girl Laura is the epitome of a true entrepreneur. Laura’s spirit for adventure and passion for people blaze through House of Coco. She founded House of Coco in 2014 and has grown it in to an internationally recognised brand whilst having a lot of fun along the way. Travel is in her DNA and she is a true visionary and a global citizen.