New strategies for the coffee by-products recovery as a new raw material for animal feed

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

BACKGROUND

In 2018, consumers in European countries drank the equivalent of 2.7 million tonnes of coffee and used 21 billion coffee capsules. One kilogram of coffee generates around 2 kilograms of wet Spent Coffee Grounds (SCG), while each capsule contains 9 grams of coffee, generating 18 grams of wet SCG and 3 grams of plastic and aluminium waste. Wet SCG is generated in the HORECA (hotels, restaurants and cafs) sector (36%), in the soluble coffee industry (14%) and in domestic consumption (50%). Currently, wet SCG is partially valorised in low added-value applications such as fertilisers and energy, but around 46% of this by-product is still managed as a waste and disposed in landfills or incinerated.

Meanwhile, livestock diets in Europe are mainly composed of imported materials. Projections show that livestock will increase by 70% by 2050. Therefore, it is necessary to reduce the environmental pressures of the production of animal feed. The substitution of soybean with SCG can be an alternative for this purpose, with the additional beneficial effect of reducing methane emissions from animals. The use of SCG as a feed ingredient for dairy livestock contributes therefore to an efficient use of resources and to the reduction of the environmental impact of the coffee value chain, animal feed production, agricultural soil overexploitation, and the livestock sector.

OBJECTIVES

The LIFE ECOFFEED project aims to develop, demonstrate and implement at real scale an innovative and sustainable solution for the recovery of coffee by-products through their upgrading as a feed ingredient for dairy livestock. The project will focus on coffee by-products generated by the soluble coffee industry and the HORECA sector, since coffee by-products from domestic consumption do not meet the hygienic requirements for animal feed.

The project objectives address public strategies and EU policy goals, as they are based on a circular economy approach and will reduce the environmental impact of the current management of coffee by-products. It will also reduce the potential impact related to livestock feed, providing a new feed ingredient and promoting resource efficiency in a symbiotic scheme that will help the EU shift towards a circular and green economy.

RESULTS

Expected results:

Two innovative logistic systems to increase the collection efficiency of coffee by-products, namely spent coffee grounds (SCG) and capsules;

Collection and processing of 21 tonnes of SCG and 1.5 tonnes of coffee capsules;

Production of 1.125 tonnes of pellets based on spent coffee grounds unsuitable for animal feed as an alternative fuel to increase the drying efficiency of spent coffee grounds for feed production, and production of 375 kg of plastics and aluminium for recycling;

Production of 10.25 tonnes of SCG-based ingredient (9.25 tonnes of non-hydrolysed ingredient and 1 tonne of hydrolysed ingredient) and 10% substitution of conventional animal feed ingredients with spent coffee grounds;

Production of 100 tonnes of experimental feed for 7 experimental diets, to be compared with 100 tonnes of control feed in three control diets;

Reduction of 5 752 kgCO2eq.;

Valorisation scheme to produce a new ingredient for animal feed from wet SCG tested and demonstrated at semi-industrial scale.