STiR coffee and tea magazine

36 STiR coffee and tea | 2023 Issue 4 (August / September) Capsule Industry to Gather in Barcelona The crema of the crop of the world's coffee industry will once again meet up at a major conference in Barcelona this September. Organized by AMI, the event serves as a forum for stakeholders to jointly analyze industry challenges and debate how to achieve sustainable progress. It also pro- vides a stage to debate and evaluate the industry's global trends, innovations, and opportunities throughout the value chain of plastic and metal capsules. Keynote speakers will provide dele- gates with in-depth insights on a broad vari- ety of industry topics, including brewing and dispensing system innovation; smart tech- nologies; capsule filling and molding tech- nologies; material innovation, sustainability, and regulations; and consumer trends. Attendees and exhibitors will include professionals from throughout the indus- try: capsule fillers, coffee roasters, capsule molders, material suppliers, technology, and machinery suppliers, as well as com- panies expanding the scope of applications for single-serve capsules. The event takes place during September 26–28 at Barce- lona's Novotel Barcelona City hotel. For information, contact AMI – Applied Market Intelligence Ltd. at info@amiplastics.com. all. And even among them, only a fraction are entirely compostable. Most have at least one non-compostable element, com- monly the lid. Conflicting logic And there are more complications. Spent capsules are usually disposed of with the used coffee grounds inside. This organic matter is compostable. But what if it is packed in a pod that is to be recycled? The material has to be separated in order to comply with the composting require- ment on the one hand, and the recycling rule on the other. "Ideally, we should be aiming at recovering that organic content to adhere to the mandatory composting requirements," she explained. By that logic, the preferred method for all capsules — cups plus contents — should be composting them. But, as Fong pointed out, currently less than 4% of the global market is in compostable solutions. The upshot is that the only way to comply with the compostability clause would be for the whole market to swap to compostable cups. "This is really, really, really prob- lematic for the industry," Fong said. It is indeed not only commercially impos- sible, but it's impossible technologically, because not all capsule designs can easily utilize compostables. As Fong remarked: "As long as capsules are recyclable — and aluminum is recyclable, so is PPL — why should you have to move to a com- postable material?" Dodging disaster The capsule industry took issue with this, and began to lobby the EU, submitting a proposal for amendment in April. This proposal firstly requests that only those capsules that are disposed of without coffee grounds inside will be considered packaging under the PPWD; they would not be treated as packaging if they con- tain coffee when thrown away. A second amendment asks to remove rigid single-serve capsules from the man- datory composting clause altogether. However, it left in flexible pods (like K-Cup, whose mesh is made of com- postable material anyway) as well as cof- fee bags (i.e., brewing pads and drip bags) as well as conventional coffee filters. The amendment proposal will now have to undergo a final vote in EU parliament, expected in September. Fong said she hoped that "dooms- day for the industry will be averted" by the EU parliament voting to ratify the proposed amendments. If not, and the amendments are rejected, the industry will find itself in dire straits. Whichever version of the directive gets ratified will automatically become a regulation. That means that each and every EU member state would have to implement it to the letter and, as Fong puts it, "not interpret it in their own way." Further challenges lie ahead. Some EU countries have an adequate, well- oiled recycling and composting infra- structure in place. Others do not. "How can you then find a way to please ev- erybody?" Fong asked. And then what about the EU's Single Use Plastics Direc- tive (SUPD)? Capsule manufacturers and coffee companies alike must wrestle with that requirement. Stay tuned. Largest capsule suppliers. The world's leading capsule systems.

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