Producing Pollutants With Coffee Roasting

You may think that coffee roasting isn't of very much concern when someone is producing organic, environmentally and socially responsible coffee through the fair trade system. After all, on the one hand great care is taken to make sure coffee growers are paid properly and are able to maintain a decent life from their profits.

On the other hand, one element of fair trade practices is to help the farmers learn to use environmentally friendly and sustainable farming methods to produce the crops. So aren't the most important environmental aspects of fair trade coffee pretty much taken care of by the time harvest rolls around?

Although it sounds so innocuous, coffee roasting is quite an involved process and produces pollutants as byproducts. The smoke alone from the roasting carries alcohols, organic acids, and nitrogen and sulfur compounds. Most roasters use ovens that are powered by natural gas.

There is usually a second oven meant to clean the air of all the pollutants, which adds to the gas used and the CO2 emissions. Even though steps are now being taken to use just one oven and even recapture the heat from the cleaned air, your morning cup of fresh coffee is definitely looking less green by the minute.

Fair trade and environmentally responsible farming may result in organic coffee beans, but that's just the first step in turning the coffee industry completely green.

If the subsequent coffee roasting and other processes continue to be energy hogs and go on wasting vast amounts of resources, what good does it ultimately do that the beans themselves are organic?

It probably makes some small difference, but the good is undone unless all the steps between the field and your morning cup of coffee are equally environmentally responsible.

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