An audience of 100 joined us in the Kelvin Lecture Theatre for a future-facing talk by Safia Qureshi Founder and CEO of CupClub (CupClub Twitter) with Mark Dowling, Technical Director of Giraffe Innovations (Giraffe Twitter)
Important note: These are the author's personal recollections and interpretations, which are likely to suffer from errors and selectivity. There is no endorsement from the IET or the speaker.
Single use packaging is unsustainable - it has been big news this year, as too much is not recycled or reused and ends up in the oceans - we use four times more than is sustainable. The UK has a 2025 commitment to being 100% reusable, compostable or recyclable, so how can we distribute food and drink sustainably?
Who loves coffee? Nearly all of us - but only very few people take their own cups to be filled up. As we use approx five billion coffee cups per year in the UK, this is a good place to start the revolution!
A few details of the CupClub scheme:
- Winner of the Ellen McArthur prize
- Cups are delivered to the coffee outlet ready to serve. They are used, returned for washing and then put back in use.
- For the user, it is drink and drop
- It is free to the user with a charge of 15p per cup to the outlet.
- The drop-off cases are custom designed to look different from bins and to prevent cups being removed by passers-by. They are located where people will finish their drinks, such as nearby offices.
The technology:
- Same size as a standard cup, made of light plastic
- Gen 1 is currently out there; Gen 2 later this year
- Cup and lid are separate items; the logo on each has the RFID puck
- Standard infrastructure with POS terminals etc
- On ordering, the customer is authenticated as a CupClub member and the items are checked out to that user, as in a library
- The user has 2 to 3 days to drop it off (somewhere else)
- There is no user data recorded on the product. They do get useful usage data: who, when and where
- They know where the product is and how often it has been used
Environmental:
- Mark has performed a complete lifecycle analysis (which has been peer reviewed by ISO bodies) to get real, holistic, end to end impacts; fully costed for the manufacture, wash, distribute, use, return and wash cycle
- The environmental impact assessment needed a large quantity of data to be captured and analysed; this included chemicals, power, wastage and water
- They used a commercial analysis package that has a comprehensive database of materials. This is complex as some "biodegradable" materials actually need special conditions and a very long time to biodegrade
- Then compared with other processes and competitors' products. Involved reverse engineering and behaving like a "Mystery Shopper"
- The conclusion is that they use half the CO2 of disposable cups and that their cup will last a minimum of 132 times
- Currently only 0.1% of paper cups are recycled. This needs to be 80% to match CupClub. Ceramic cups are better, but not practical for take away
- Interesting warning: There is a lot of "green wash" ; many claims are not clear or substantiated e.g. "there are no chemicals in our detergent" or "Sustainable"
A lively Q & A session followed, proving that this was a topical issue that many of the audience were passionate about.
- What next after coffee cups? The focus is on items of short use, less that 1 hour, that are used close to the place of purchase (not taken home) eg take-away food tubs
- Marketing logos can be printed on. Items are sorted at the wash hub and returned to the right company
- How to encourage the return? By penalty? They have started with companies, a mostly closed system. Have rules and T&Cs. Will offer rewards
- Block chain? Chose RFID as standard and available. BlockChain has its use cases but over complicates - they don't need public visibility of its location and use
- Tracking data: How to protect the user? It is all anonymised
Many thanks to Safia and Mark for such an enlightening talk. Also as ever to the IET and Savoy Place place staff, and to Dimitris Loumanis for masterminding the event for IET Central London.