What's new
By:
Filters

Science question about "Recycling" K-cups

jeepyj

jeepyj

Middlesex NY
Joined
May 19, 2020
Member Number
57
Messages
442
Loc
Middlesex NY
You are supposed to peel the foil off, dump out the grounds and recycle the plastic cup. Yeah. Not doing that. Let's try something else. . .

I will re-define 'recycle' to 'reduce used k-cup to ash in a wood furnace without removing foil'. There are btu's in the grounds and the plastic cup. Are there any in the aluminum foil? The grounds are moist. Will there be a net gain of heat by burning or a loss because of the moisture in the grounds turning to steam?

Learn me science.

.
 
I've been wondering about those things since they first came out. My childhood was spent getting "reduce, reuse, recycle" crammed down my throat and I try my best to live it, yet here we are back as a society of disposable shit. Boggles the mind.
 
They have compostable K cups.

Like the compostable flatware. When my wife went to UW I would meet her for lunch frequently. It took 3 of those compostable forks to eat one bowl of ramen at the cafeteria. They would just melt in the soup.

To the OP, you would think the energy used to heat the remaining water into steam, would then be given off as steam energy. It would probably be a net loss though. IIRC a molecule of water expands 3000 times its original size as steam.
 
grapehead said:
I've been wondering about those things since they first came out. My childhood was spent getting "reduce, reuse, recycle" crammed down my throat and I try my best to live it, yet here we are back as a society of disposable shit. Boggles the mind.
Click to expand...

Supposedly the inventor of those things has come out regretting creating them. But he's probably also pretty bitter over selling his company/idea for just $50,000 back in the day :laughing:
 
xr-nut said:
Had to google "k-cup", since I don't wear skinny sweats and have a man bun. :lmao:
Click to expand...

I thought H-cups were the largest. :grinpimp:

2021-01-08_16-12-14.jpg
 
grapehead said:
I've been wondering about those things since they first came out. My childhood was spent getting "reduce, reuse, recycle" crammed down my throat and I try my best to live it, yet here we are back as a society of disposable shit. Boggles the mind.
Click to expand...

They have reusable baskets. You can fill it with your choice of coffee. I gave up on the Keurigs. The two I bought were junk. When the Keurig works, it makes good coffee.

$20 Mr. Coffee works fine.:smokin:
 
Fishslayer said:
They have reusable baskets. You can fill it with your choice of coffee. I gave up on the Keurigs. The two I bought were junk. When the Keurig works, it makes good coffee.

$20 Mr. Coffee works fine.:smokin:
Click to expand...

This. Reusable basket and a 20 year old $30 Mr. Coffee.
 
Probably not going to get enough heat out to be worth the effort. Especially since you'll have all the aluminum foil bits now in the ash to deal with plus whatever goop doesn't burn off from the plastic, and potential smelly/toxic fumes and junk deposits in the flue.
 
Poopyface said:
I have a burn barrel....
Click to expand...

This.
My wife drinks 1-2 cups of froofy coffee a day and I drink about that of Kirkland coffee house blend in the winter. I toss the coffee in my compost bucket, and burn the rest.
 
Fishslayer said:
They have reusable baskets. You can fill it with your choice of coffee. I gave up on the Keurigs. The two I bought were junk. When the Keurig works, it makes good coffee.

$20 Mr. Coffee works fine.:smokin:
Click to expand...

So much this. Our water sucks and killed a kuerig within a year. After the 3rd one shit itself on cue, I switched to the $20 mr.coffee. 5 years later and no cleaning it still works like new.
 
wow, I think it would take 4 seconds to peel foil, tap it on the side of your compost bin and drop the cup into recycle.

And here it takes me about 25 seconds to clean out my percolator... only thing you waste is a little bit of water. but that's renewable :stirthepot:

Anytime I have k-cup coffee, it seems like it's about 1/3 as strong as it should be. I don't think I'd ever buy one. I'm not a coffee snob, my main requirement is that it not be weak.
 
Last edited:
dnsfailure said:
wow, I think it would take 4 seconds to peel foil, tap it on the side of your compost bin and drop the cup into recycle.

And here it takes me about 25 seconds to clean out my percolator... only thing you waste is a little bit of water. but that's renewable :stirthepot:

Anytime I have k-cup coffee, it seems like it's about 1/3 as strong as it should be. I don't think I'd ever buy one. I'm not a coffee snob, my main requirement is that it not be weak.
Click to expand...

At work, some guys a few cubes away have a keurig. We all split buying the over priced shit, but its way better than the folgers at the coffee bar. They look at me weird when I use 2 k-cups to fill a larger ceramic mug (12oz). I run each on the middle setting. The 16oz setting makes it taste like water. I think most k-cup drinkers put a bunch of shit in their coffee, so hot water would be just as good. I am a cheap coffee snob, on the weekends I do fresh ground right in the French press. Work days its fresh grounds through a drip machine so I have enough for a big stainless cup. We really like the whole beans from sams, organic breakfast blend is 2.5lbs for $13. I make it strong.
 
Lurker said:
At work, some guys a few cubes away have a keurig. We all split buying the over priced shit, but its way better than the folgers at the coffee bar. They look at me weird when I use 2 k-cups to fill a larger ceramic mug (12oz). I run each on the middle setting. The 16oz setting makes it taste like water. I think most k-cup drinkers put a bunch of shit in their coffee, so hot water would be just as good. I am a cheap coffee snob, on the weekends I do fresh ground right in the French press. Work days its fresh grounds through a drip machine so I have enough for a big stainless cup. We really like the whole beans from sams, organic breakfast blend is 2.5lbs for $13. I make it strong.
Click to expand...

so long as it ain't weak, it's fine with me :smokin:
 
I heard china wont take our recycled plastic anymore, so it just gets burned or dumped in some third world country.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Back Refresh