There's probably no coffee better than one made from freshly ground coffee beans.
And now some clever people at RMIT University have come up with a way those cuppas can do their bit for the environment.
They're calling it "coffee concrete" which has been given its first outing in a major infrastructure project, the Pakenham Roads Upgrade, as part of Victoria's Big Build.
What the team at RMIT has done is use spent coffee grounds to make biochar that is mixed with concrete, replacing a portion of the river sand that would normally be used.
The waste from the coffee beans would otherwise have gone to landfill.
RMIT research fellow and lead inventor Dr Rajeev Roychand said at Pakenham five tonnes of spent coffee grounds from making about 140,000 cups of coffee was converted into two tonnes of usable biochar and mixed into 30 cubic metres of footpath constructed along McGregor Rd.
He said there was potential to divert all forms of biodegradable organic waste from landfills, which contribute three per cent of Australia's greenhouse gas emissions.
For the statistically minded, the researchers say Australians' love of a coffee generates about 75 million kilograms of coffee ground waste every year which could replace up to 655 million kilograms of the less dense river sand.
World wide it is estimated there is about 10 billion kilograms of spent coffee produced annually which could replace up to 90 billion kilograms of sand.
A strong black, please!!