These buses in London will be powered by coffee
Even these buses need their fill of caffeine.
Waste coffee grounds will be powering some of London's buses from Monday on, according to tech firm bio-bean, and petrol giant Shell.
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The biofuel contains coffee oil, extracted from waste coffee grounds. This biofuel, which makes up 20 percent of the final fuel blend, will then be mixed with traditional diesel.
According to bio-bean, the average Londoner drinks 2.3 cups of coffee a day, translating to over 200,000 tonnes of waste a year.
The company takes some of these used coffee grounds from high street chains and factories, drying and processing them before oil can be extracted. This is later processed into a blended B20 biofuel, which simply refers to biofuel which is mixed with petroleum diesel.
Buses can run on the fuel without any need for modification.
Image: Dinendra Haria/REX/Shutterstock
So far, 6,000 litres of coffee oil have been produced, which according to the firm could power a bus for an entire year, if mixed with diesel.
“It’s a great example of what can be done when we start to reimagine waste as an untapped resource," said bio-bean founder Arthur Kay in a press release.
"Thousands of litres of coffee-derived B20 biodiesel will help power London buses for the first time.”
Bio-bean is a London-based startup that won an innovation award from Shell in 2013.
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