The resulting product will be used to manufacture parts for the coffee makers of the INCAPTO company, a collaborator in the project

Research staff from the URV’s Department of Chemical Engineering and the INCAPTO coffee brand are working together on a project involving sustainability, circular economy and biomass transformation. In particular, the research aims to convert coffee grounds into bioplastics and other composite materials, to be used, for example, to manufacture coffee machine parts. Funded by two calls for grants from the Catalan Government’s University and Research Grant Management Agency (AGAUR), the project is part of a doctoral thesis by Vaibhav Andhalkar supervised by researchers Magda Constantí and Francesc Medina, who also head the research group Tecnio AMIC (Environmental and Industrial Applications of Catalysis). 

“At a time when decarbonisation is a global priority, it is very important to try to make products with added value from biomass, one of the main sources of green energy on the planet,” says Medina. And, speaking specifically about coffee grounds, the numbers prove it: approximately 9.5 million tons of coffee are consumed worldwide every year. Since 650 kilograms of sludge are generated for each ton, 6.2 million tons of sludge are produced annually. As Magda Constantí explains, “this organic waste is rich in lignocellulosic material, and when it is subject to a physicochemical treatment it releases sugars that are transformed into bioplastics through the action of microorganisms”. For his part, Francesc Medina explains that the diversity and potential of coffee make it “an exceptionally interesting material for the research and development of new sustainable products”. 

Bea Mesas, co-founder and CPO of INCAPTO, says that the company is proud “to be part of this major project alongside the Universitat Rovira i Virgili and to find a second life for all the waste created by the coffee industry.” And Magda Constantí recalls that “the use of biomass waste is an alternative to the consumption of fossil fuels and focuses on the circular economy”. In this regard, the company’s aim is for the resulting material to be used to manufacture components for its coffee machines or other disposable materials. It is a project in which the URV remains committed to research into biomass and bioplastics, and the INCAPTO company, founded in 2020, to sustainability and waste reductio