Compostable coffee cups still ending up in landfills

General Manager of Mojo NZ Katy Ellis says their compostable cups are going straight the landfill. Photo / Melissa Nightingale

Hundreds of thousands of compostable coffee cups are clogging up landfills because councils around the country won't compost them.

Iconic Wellington coffee chain Mojo is one business which paid extra to provide the compostable cups to its customers, only to find an ingredient in the cups ruled them out for composting.

The cups contain an ingredient called polylactic acid (PLA), which Wellington City Council has banned from its commercial composter in order to obtain a special organic certification.

"We have for a long time been pursuing a BioGro organic certification for our Capital Compost. Now that we have achieved this and to meet continuing certification criteria we can no longer accept compostable bags and compostable coffee cups," said council's waste operations manager Emily Taylor-Hall.

Portfolio leader for waste councillor Iona Pannett said in a statement corn starch and PLA compostable bags and cups were convenient, but including them with other organic material prevented council from getting certification, and diminished the value of its compost.

"We need to find alternatives such as more regular cleaning of bins and keepcups," she said.

But Mojo general manager Katy Ellis could not understand why council was valuing the BioGro certification over waste minimisation.

"We know they're already selling their compost now, so we don't really understand the issue," said Ellis.

She felt council's stance was contrary to their messages around protecting the environment and acting sustainably.

It was likely hundreds of thousands of their cups alone were going into landfills each year.

Commonsense Organics co-owner Marion Wood had also been putting money into providing compostable packaging on her products.

She said the news council would no longer take the packaging was initially discouraging, but "we can't give up".

"We've got to keep on working on this and working with council and working with Government," she said.

There was a need for mandatory labelling to separate certified compostable products from others, she said.

Many of her customers had their own composters, so she would continue supplying compostable packaging.

"If we all work together we will get there in the end," she said.

Councillor Pannett said people needed to resist "easy options that don't actually make a difference".

Christchurch City Council also does not accept compostable coffee cups or bin liners, and while Tauranga City Council diverts relevant food waste to its worm farm, coffee cups don't make the cut.

They encourage council staff to use reusable cups instead.

"A recent waste audit undertaken at council found only a small amount of disposable coffee cups in our waste stream – suggesting our recent initiatives in this space have made a real impact."

Auckland Council's spokeswoman said the city's two landfills are owned by a private company, and they were not aware of that company offering a composting service.

But Ellis said they used another private company in Auckland called We Compost, so they were able to avoid contributing to growing waste there.