Food - Drink
How A Ball Of Coffee Could Change Your Morning Routine Forever
By LAUREN ROTHMAN
As of 2022, approximately 40% of U.S. consumers own a single-cup coffee brewing system, also known a K-cup coffee systems or by the brand name Keurig. These machines brew coffee and other drinks through single-use, disposable plastic K-Cups, which are notorious for being environmentally unfriendly.
Keurig attempted to make their machines more sustainable, and by the end of 2020, all of the brand's K-Cups were recyclable. However, Swiss retailer Migros has come up with a Keurig-like machine called the CoffeeB that uses coffee balls, spherical capsules of coffee grounds encased in a thin, tasteless seaweed base.
Coffee balls will be available in varieties such as decaf, espresso, and organic, and unlike K-cups, each ball can be completely composted after the coffee is brewed. The CoffeeB will debut in Switzerland, France, and Germany this year, and may reduce the thousands of tons of waste produced by K-Cup coffee systems.