[USCC] Coffee Grounds

Mon Feb 5 17:36:44 CST 2007

Dear Colleagues:

A few comments to help smooth the waves of this discussion.

I agree with Jim that a large mistake was made on the danger of DDT which led to cessation of its use in mosquito control in tropical countries. With millions of deaths which could have been prevented. And other points he made regarding local use to protect humans directly rather than widespread application in the environment. The risk to many raptor species, and near loss of the California Condor and bald eagle taught us many lessons. Reduction in robins and other species which consume earthworms showed that soil to earthworm (bioconcentration) to robin (earthworm consumer) pathway of chlorinated hydrocarbons.

I agree with Heidi that we need to recognize that the availability of DDT will allow some persons to apply DDT on coffee trees, and efven on coffee berries if they think it would protect their economic interest. Purchasers have to specify what is allowed or they can get stuck with contaminated products. And many conduct quality control analyses on purchased food ingredients to protect their interests. No all do such careful quality control to avoid contaminants that shouldn't be there in the first place.

Jim's comments about As in treated wood, and accidents from ash from burned treated wood is also true.  I believe he is wrong about melanoma; arsenic causes a more traditional skin cancer which is not life threatening, but also causes internal cancers (liver, bladder) which has caused the reduction in allowed arsenic in drinking water in the last decade. 

I would expect much of the DDT in coffee berries to be volatilized during roasting of the berries. It would be in the exhaust gas at the temperatures involved. Of DDT that remained in the roasted berries, little would enter the coffee due to limited water solubility. On the other hand, the remaining DDT would tend to be dissolved in the organic soluble materials of the roasted berries. I can remember some coffee with a sheen on the surface from the fatty or waxy materials in the ground coffee. 

Thus, some part of the DDT in ground roasted coffee would end up in the "grounds" which could be composted. The pathways for DDT in soils and plants is well enough known to discuss risks. DDT is rapidly and strongly bound to humic materials in soils, reducing potential for plant uptake. DDT is not absorbed and translocated inside plants, but volatilized from the soil surface and caught on the waxy surface of leaves. That transfer is small, and pretty irrelevant to risks from composts of coffee grounds. Soil ingestion by grazing livestock is the usually "most sensitive" pathway for lipophilic organics like DDT in soils. Gardeners don't eat so much soil, so they are not at as great risk. Actually the risk if from DDT bioaccumulated in the livestock, and then consumed by humans; cancer risk (arguable) was the risk that DDT limits were based upon. 

Of all garden crops, carrot peel accumulates the most DDT. But nearly all the DDT accumulated in carrots in stuck in the peel layer. I understand that some people consume carrots without peeling, but my mother taught me otherwise. I can't imagine a good reason for anyone to consume unpeeled carrots, and for urban soil gardens, or gardens that you don't know the long term history of pesticide use, I would choose to peel carrots.

If you want a review paper on PCB and DDT accumulation in plants and risk from soil amendments, send me a request and I'll send the long and boring technical details.

Regards,

Rufus

The referenced chart leaves me with more questions than answers: How has the data changed in 23 years?

What effect does roasting and brewing have?  I could imagine roasting either increasing or decreasing concentration.  

As Jim is trying to say through his "diatribe" we need a sense of relative risk.  What risk is created by the 2-20 ppb in the green coffee?  Obviously the highest risk is to the direct consumer of the coffee, assuming that some DDT is leached out by the brewing process.  That leaves less in the grounds, which is then further diluted by the bulking agents and other feedstocks being composted as well as being somewhat degraded by the composting process itself.  Then there is the exposure route.  Direct eating?  Plant uptake? That very small increase in risk (we are not sure to what) must then weighed against other options for the grounds (landfilling, incineration) and the other benefits of recycling the organic matter and nutrients.  For me the balance it way over on the use side for coffee grounds.  Organic gardeners have been using them directly as mulch for years around acid-loving plants.

Cary Oshins
GARDENIQUE Landscaping, Inc.
610-972-9018
www.filtrexx.com 
Filtrexx-Our Soxx don't fall down!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-----Original Message-----
From: compost-bounces at composter.com [mailto:compost-bounces at composter.com] 
On Behalf Of Heide Hermary
Sent: Saturday, February 03, 2007 12:38 PM

To: Compost Discussion List

Subject: Re: [USCC] Coffee Grounds

I am sure everybody on this list is familiar with the following paper: 
"Persistence and Degradation of Pesticides n Composting"
http://www.ciwmb.ca.gov/Publications/Organics/44200015.pdf 

Here are some statistics on pesticide residue in coffee
http://www.headlice.org/lindane/lindane/products/coffee.htm 

About 15 years ago when I first became aware of this I went to one of 
our government offices in Vancouver, Canada to find out about the 
regulations for DDT residue on coffee, and that's where the 2 cup / day 
figure came from.  In those days I wasn't concerned about documenting my 
sources, but I am sure the info is available for those who ask.

Judging from the diatribe below I assume that no tests of DDT residue were ever made on compost derived from huge amounts of coffee grounds. Or if they were, they showed exorbitant levels which must be justified as safe.

Garbage in, garbage out. You wouldn't compost treated lumber, so why create compost from a single feedstock known to contain residue of persistent environmental toxins?

Heide
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jim McNelly wrote:
>At 11:30 PM 2/2/2007, you wrote:

>>What about the DDT levels in non-organic coffee? Apparently there is
>>measurable DDT residue, but it is "acceptable" based on a 2 cup / day
>>habit.  Not sure what it would do to DDT levels in soils if used in high
>>amounts.
>>Heide
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Greetings,
>
>The safety of DDT and its demonization is, in my opinion, one of the 
>most tragic legacies of the early environmental movement.  The vivid 
>images projected in Rachel Carson's book "A Silent Spring" portrayed 
>tragic consequences resulting from the widespread misuse of DDT to 
>control mosquitos and reduce malaria.  When spread by the hundreds of 
>tons year after year, it bio-accumulates in the food chain until the 
>point that raptors, such as the bald eagle, concentrate it in their 
>systems such that the viability of their egg shells is diminished and 
>there are fewer predatory birds growing to maturity.
>
>In the mad rush to stop this terrible problem, DDT was totally banned 
>world wide.  Over time, DDT levels have dropped in the food chain and 
>raptors have made a remarkable comeback, even to the point that the 
>bald eagle has been removed from the endangered species list.  In the 
>effort to protect raptors, however, home and personal use of DDT was 
>also banned.  DDT was used so widely because it is one of the safest 
>pesticides ever developed, having virtually no effect when directly 
>exposed to plants or animals, attacking only certain forms of 
>insects.  It is completely safe to use in the home, the yard and for 
>personal use.  The problem was never with DDT itself; the problem was 
>with its misuse and the manner in which widespread spraying was 
>impacting the food chain.
>
>Banning DDT in home use, where it has been proven to be the safest 
>and most effective pesticide for controlling malaria bearing 
>mosquitoes, has resulted in the needless deaths of millions of adults 
>and children around the world to malaria.  There is no possible way 
>that DDT use in the home could ever produce sufficient quantities to 
>get back into the food chain such that it would bio-accumulate to 
>ever impact raptor eggs.
>
>Finally, after decades of scientific evidence proving the safety of 
>DDT for home use, the United Nations lifted the ban on DDT.  This was 
>delayed for over a decade due to dire warnings of DDT use without any 
>evidence.  Now that the ban has been lifted, the drop in malaria 
>rates have been dramatic and children are no longer dying as readily 
>from malaria.  DDT is now approved for use in homes, for spraying on 
>the walls  and in baby's cribs as its safety to humans is 
>irrefutable.  This is one example where environmental overreaction 
>has been overcome.
>
>DDT is not approved on crops or for widespread spraying, where its 
>dangers are documented.  Consequently, unless there is a rogue 
>illegal sprayer, I can see no possible way that we could have DDT on 
>coffee or any food crop.  Even if there were, it is not a biohazard 
>to humans at such ingestion rates.  Where is your evidence that it is 
>"apparently" in coffee?  Yes it is persistent, but I doubt that it is 
>*that* persistent where it is drawn up systemically from the soil 
>from use forty to fifty years ago.
>
>As I see it, to worry about DDT in coffee is simply "groundless".
>
>The issue of more concern to me is the context of associating DDT 
>with compost.  To grab a highly emotional term such as "DDT" and 
>associate it with the safety of food and compost without any 
>scientific basis for concern is, from my perspective, just another of 
>dozens of examples of bewildering arguments against compost and 
>composting that our industry has to face again and again and 
>again.  Even if there were significant quantities of DDT in coffee, 
>why would the coffee industry not be targeted, I wonder?  Why would 
>the use of compost be challenged instead?  In addition, while there 
>is a real biohazard in the home environment, arsenic from treated 
>lumber, why would perceptual biohazards need to be imagined?
>
>Heide, if you want to work on a *real* environmental toxicity issue, 
>why not look into the issue of treated lumber?  It is over 3000 PMM 
>arsenic and over 1000 PPM lead, both of which are very high 
>concentrations in a household setting.  Arsenic pollutes when it is 
>manufactured. Unwashed arsenic on wet wood or trimmed ends can lead 
>to skin cancer. While arsenic does not leach into the garden while 
>the lumber is structurally sound, it does leach when the wood rots, 
>which it eventually does, typically around 25 years. Already banks 
>are looking at arsenic clean up liabilities when loans are made.
>
>Why not look into the problem of lumber yard workers being exposed to 
>its sawdust?  Why not look into children being exposed to arsenic 
>sawdust under playground structures? What about the problem of 
>sawdust from treated lumber deck construction floating into Koi ponds 
>or being ingested by children?  Wear gloves and a dust mask, cut a 1" 
>square of treated lumber and put it in a 20 gallon aquarium with a 
>goldfish and see what happens.  The fish dies, of course.
>
>People worry about arsenic in biosolids at 47 PPM, close to many soil 
>background levels, while their children may be eating arsenic sawdust 
>in their own yard at levels nearly 100 times higher!  Did you know 
>that arsenic in the air is often the highest air pollution problem in 
>some northern cities during the winter as it is unfortunately used as 
>fuel in burn barrels?  Did you know that arsenic from a house fire 
>with a treated lumber deck will rain a fallout plume of arsenic ash 
>down wind for miles on unsuspecting residents, not to mention the 
>exposure risk to firefighters?  The ash from treated lumber fires is 
>also highly toxic, leading to safety concerns in camp fires, burn 
>barrels, clean up workers and landfill operators that take this toxic 
>ash.  In the county I live in, 24 cows died from ingesting ash from 
>treated lumber scraps burned by the farmer after building a 
>fence.  While ingesting small quantities of arsenic may not be a 
>deadly biohazard, leading only to short term nervous system and 
>kidney disorders, getting it on your skin even in minute quantities 
>can lead to deadly melanoma, skin cancer, within twenty five 
>years.  Its ash form, when improperly burned, it when it is the most
dangerous.
>
>I think that it is no coincidence that melanoma deaths have increased 
>over the decades mainly in countries that allow the wide use treated 
>lumber.  We composters do not want treated lumber in our wood 
>chips.  Why not research this issue and see if there is a 
>documentable correlation between burning treated lumber and skin 
>cancer?  Arsenic at 3000 PPM is a *real* biohazard.  Work on that one 
>is a suggestion from me that could occupy your busy mind.  In the 
>meantime, unless you have a real issue to bring to us, please leave 
>compost alone with undocumented, perceptual biohazards.
>
>
>
>
>
>Jim~ McNelly
>Renewable Carbon Management LLC
>jim at composter.com 
>www.composter.com 
>
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_______________________________________________

Ongoing Sponsors of the Compost Discussion List are:

Food Industry Environmental Network (FIEN), a regulatory and policy e-mail
alert service for environmental, food and agricultural industry
professionals.
Contact Jack Cooper 301/384-8287 JLC at fien.com --- www.fien.com 

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Composting System www.composter.com rcm at composter.com 

The US Composting Council (USCC) Non-members of USCC are encouraged to join
the Council through its website at:
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Members posting CC copies to the list and other addresses may have their
posting privelages suspended.

Opinions expressed represent only the poster and are not necessarily the
opinion or policy of any organization.

The Compost List is a service moderated by Jim McNelly of Renewable Carbon
Management, LLC.

For discussion list policies and information regarding subscribing,
unsubscribing, digest or other options, go
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This month's sponsor is:

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The leading manufacturer of steel-framed, fabric membrane covered structures available in clear-span widths of 18 to 160 feet. Visit www.coverall.net to learn more or call 1.800.268.3768 to be connected with your local dealer.

_______________________________________________

Ongoing Sponsors of the Compost Discussion List are:

Food Industry Environmental Network (FIEN), a regulatory and policy e-mail alert service for environmental, food and agricultural industry professionals.
Contact Jack Cooper 301/384-8287 JLC at fien.com --- www.fien.com 

Renewable Carbon Management, LLC with the containerized, in-vessel NaturTech Composting System www.composter.com rcm at composter.com 

The US Composting Council (USCC) Non-members of USCC are encouraged to join the Council through its website at: http://www.compostingcouncil.org/membership.cfm 

(c) Copyright 2006  - All rights reserved

Members posting CC copies to the list and other addresses may have their posting privelages suspended.

Opinions expressed represent only the poster and are not necessarily the opinion or policy of any organization.

The Compost List is a service moderated by Jim McNelly of Renewable Carbon Management, LLC.

For discussion list policies and information regarding subscribing, unsubscribing, digest or other options, go to:http://mailman.cloudnet.com/mailman/listinfo/compost

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