International. Dr. Henry Leung, from the School of Chemistry and Life Sciences at NYP Singapore, and his team of three Diploma in Medical Chemistry seniors found a way to lessen the environmental impact of coffee waste. They have turned used coffee beans into a flame retardant that could be used to improve fire safety in homes and offices.
By treating coffee waste and mixing it with epoxy resin, the team was able to harness coffee's slow-burning properties to create a material that could withstand a fire up to twice as long as regular epoxy resin.
This new material has also achieved an "HB" rating, indicating slow combustion in a horizontal sample, according to initial findings from a third-party testing lab. In addition to its fire-resistant qualities, coffee epoxy resin has the potential to become a total solution to reduce coffee waste, as grounding coffee waste into compost requires a large storage space. Compost incineration is also a process that consumes space and energy.
In the future, the team will get their product tested and certified by outside experts while exploring the multitude of uses of this innovative material.
Dr. Henry Leung and his students are no strangers to turning coffee waste into sustainable products, they also successfully created a biodegradable plastic from coffee waste in 2017.
Source: NYP Singapore.
