What can we do with leftover coffee grounds?

Our ultimate goal is to use spent coffee grounds to make fire bricks and experiment with eco-friendly products. If we can make something on Svalbard that would lead to one less item being shipped or flown here then that, for us would be a major success for everyone and our arctic home.

Here are some things you can do at home with your coffee grounds that might inspire your imagination;

• plant fertilizer

• mushroom growing kits

• skin exfoliation (mixed with a oil typically)

  The application of waste from coffee is a sustainable side branch of our business that would be non-profit and more in reducing waste and the number of products shipped to the island. We would welcome ideas and help from our community in this mission.

  Below are planned projects

Fire bricks

Svalbard imports all of its firewood, so we would aim to make a brick of compressed spent coffee grounds to burn in supplement of wood.

Coffee fire bricks can produce almost twice as much heat as wood per kg and produces a nice smell that repels insects.

Biofuel

This is a personal side project of one of our roasters and not for the community for the obvious risks that come of making a highly flammable fuel. The project would aim to run a Snowmobile on Biofuel using various methods from used coffee material.

We are not sure if this would be possible given the materials we have access to, but it is more an attempt to prove that it can be done and hopefully inspire others out there to take what we have learnt and run with it.

Growing Mushrooms

We have coffee and coffee bags, both of which can be used to grow edible and medicinal mushrooms although this project needs a non-freezing space away from the living space of people, due to the spores. We are hopeful that within a few years that we can work with someone who can offer assistance in this project, once again produce food on the island.