Coffee’s getting a second wind!

If there weren’t enough reasons to love one of the world’s most popular beverages, an entrepreneur from the Bay Area is extending the life of coffee beans by repurposing grounds from shops and industrial brewers to derive oils used for personal care and household projects.

Launched in 2020 by Aaron Feigelman, The Kawa Project utilizes science as a means of mitigating climate change by developing functional materials from food waste. Feigelman became interested in this issue while studying at UCLA, where he learned about the global impact of food waste and resource insecurity while researching vegetable oil production.

Inspired to make a difference, he began looking into methods of upcycling food waste for his senior thesis.

“I saw from Project Drawdown that food waste mitigation is the #1 way to fight climate change,” Feigelman tells Replate. “I zoomed in on coffee grounds because the oil was very unique, and useful for palm oil alternatives in cosmetics.”

More than half of American packaged products contain palm oil, which accounted for around 8% of global deforestation between 1990 and 2008, according to The Wildlife Trusts. Deforestation not only harms natural habitats, it uproots communities, and leaves behind territory that is often illegally burned down generating carbon dioxide.

With a mission in mind, Feigelman began experimenting. He read “quite a few scientific papers,” bought laboratory equipment, and set up shop in his dorm room. Not surprisingly, there were “lots of iterations” before he was able to hone in on a viable process for reusing the grounds.

These days, The Kawa Project collects and dries used grounds from coffee producers, then extracts and refines the oils using clean chemical processes. It consists of a mixture of organic and non-organic grounds, and a variety of fatty acids. The oil is fractionated and incorporated into personal care and food products, such as soaps, bath wash, candles, laundry detergent, skin care…even lip balm!

Now in start-up mode, The Kawa Project is exploring possibilities in the upcycled food movement. According to the International Food Information Council, 52% of consumers report an increased awareness of the environmental impact their food choices represent, and are looking for more sustainable products.

On the increasing interest in repurposing food and food byproducts, Feigelman notes, “It's becoming more mainstream,” pointing out Kroger’s recent partnership with Upcycled Foods as an example.

In April, Upcycled Foods announced the launch of a line of bread items co-developed with Kroger for its Simple Truth store brand, which consist of 10% ReGrained SuperGrain+, a material byproduct derived from brewing beer. The new Simple Truth upcycled items—Seeded Multigrain Bread and Multigrain Quinoa Bread—will be available in 1,800 Kroger locations.

This development follows a trend established by organizations like Matriarck Foods, Evergrain, Brew’ed Biscuits, Dairy Distillery, and countless others to not only waste less, but extend the value of our resources.

And now…The Kawa Project joins the mission.

Learn more about The Kawa Project on their website.

And find out everything about Replate here!