As the war on plastic pollutions gathers pace, one forward-looking South Wales company is doing its bit to cut the number of disposable coffee cups it throws away.
ESE Direct has helped one of its long-standing customers to swap to eco-friendly, compostable cups for its staff drinks.
Knowing that ESE supplies a wide range of industrial recycled and recycling products, their customer put in the slightly unusual request.
ESE Direct sales manager Mark Wilson said: "Our customer, a medical equipment design and manufacturing company, asked us to provide coffee cups and stipulated that they must be compostable because the company has a policy of reducing as far as possible what it sends to landfill."
"We found a suitable product for them and the last order they made was for around 5,000 coffee cups for their staff drinks’ dispensers."
According to an article in USA Today consumers worldwide use an estimated 600 billion paper and plastic cups each year - most of which are binned.
In the UK, the government is looking at the best ways to deal with the environmental impact of throwaway coffee cups. It has so far ruled out a suggested 25p so-called 'latte levy' on disposable cups.
Meanwhile, environmentally-conscious companies are proactively opting for compostable versions rather than send more waste to landfill.