Many cafés and fast food places these days provide disposable dishes and cutlery when you’re eating in. This used to infuriate me, but it seems to be improving slightly now as the trend has moved towards using compostable dishes instead of plastic ones.
However, it’s still waste. It makes me wonder, what is more costly in the long run? Providing customers with compostable items or running hot dishwashers and using soap and water all day to reuse dishes?
I seem to recall many years ago it was reported that a ceramic mug had such a high embodied energy that it was equivalent to 1000+ paper cups.
This definitely needs fact checking but it’s an interesting consideration when you’re considering the impact on the planet
So I’m in the clear after 3 years of morning coffees?
Erm. ChatGPT reckons it’s closer to 20-40 cups for the same embodied energy. So my recollection was well off the mark.
Chatgpt is not a source.