Australia creates around 67 million tonnes of waste each year. It’s an astronomical figure, hard to fathom, and has driven a lot of community concern around the effects that waste is having on our planet.

Prior to 2020, a percentage of Australia’s waste was exported, including plastic, paper, glass and tyres. But, as of July 1st Australia has implemented a Waste Response Strategy, partially in response to growing concern and off the back of China’s change in policy around restrictions on importing recyclable materials.

Although the official date for the new legislation being passed is postponed due to COVID-19, The Council Of Australian Governments has created several steps in their new Strategy. The phases range from education, investing in new infrastructure, minimising single use products and packaging, simplifying the labeling etc. all helpful and important in the way we choose to handle waste here in Aus.

HOW CAN YOU HELP?
It’s important to know that reducing, reusing and recycling are still three great ways you can eliminate waste & protect our environment.

Reduce
This means aiming to use less in order to avoid waste OR alternatively using natural resources instead.

Reuse
You can reuse products and packaging in its original state or pass on to someone else who may be able to.

Recycle
Be sure to recycle when you can, but do so correctly. Following the recycling info on packaging & keeping in line with your council’s guidelines.

It’s also fairly important to research companies that you’re purchasing from as a consumer. Check how and where they operate, do they use environmentally friendly packaging, are they offsetting their emissions? Every time we purchase something, we are making a decision about our future.

What are we doing?

We are Carbon Neutral
Importing coffee from around the world, roasting & distributing it around the country requires a considerable amount of energy and can result in significant carbon emissions. We offset every one of these emissions by purchasing carbon credits from renewable energy programs across the globe. Certification of our program is provided by The Carbon Reduction Institute. It is based on assessing each one of our purchases, our processes, our distribution, our travel and even how we get to work. This guarantees that each one of our products is 100% carbon neutral.

We run on Solar Power – when the sun is out!
We have reduced approximately 60% of our electricity grid usage by installing a 60kW solar panel system to our roasting facility. During the summer months we expect to cover as much as 80%.

We made the switch from capsules to pods
Prior to the release of Shots by Genovese 2.0, we stocked capsules. Although ESE pods have been around for a while, they are less common here in Australia in comparison to Capsules. We feel making the switch was important for the environment and our dedication to being sustainable.

Each pod is encased in a food grade filter paper which is 100% compostable & biodegradable.

The used pods can be placed directly into your home compost, further reducing the impact of the environmental footprint. The outer tin is made from a fully recyclable aluminium which can be added to your everyday recycling. We’ve found that some companies wrap each pod, but we have nitro flushed our tins for added freshness without the extra waste.

Thus far, we have saved thousands of capsules from going into landfill, and we feel pretty good about that.