Trying to quench Americans’ growing thirst for specialty coffees while still downing a profit, Northwest coffee roasters are exploring innovative ways to manage the energy-intensive coffee roasting process. Equipment upgrades are becoming more appetizing to business owners, as Northwest electric utilities and governments offer increased funding for energy efficiency improvements. And as consumers’ awareness about sustainable business practices continues to grow, many roasters are also cashing in on the good PR.

During the roasting process, coffee beans are most often heated in a rotating drum to temperatures ranging from 500 to nearly 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit. The final color and flavor of coffee beans depends on the amount of time they are left in the roaster: The longer the roast, the darker and stronger the bean. Coffee roasters are typically fueled by natural gas; the emissions they release include volatile organic compounds, particulate matter and carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide. Oxidizers, most often called afterburners, help curb the emissions of the coffee roasting process.

Some manufacturers, such as Sandpoint, Idaho-based Diedrich Roasters, are gaining popularity among sustainable coffee roasters by offering energy-efficient afterburners. Diedrich’s IR Series of afterburners is reportedly 65 percent more energy-efficient and uses significantly less natural gas than conventional afterburners. Santa-Clara, Calif.-based Loring SmartRoast Inc. makes a coffee roaster that, in a six-month-long test, used 80 percent less natural gas than a conventional roaster — enough to be eligible for a rebate from Pacific Gas & Electric Co.

Portland-based Stumptown Coffee Roasters, a longtime buyer of renewable electricity, is attempting to significantly reduce energy consumption during its roasting process. The company received a $35,000 grant through the City of Portland’s Green Investment Fund in 2006 to study different options for capturing and reusing heat from the afterburner of its coffee roaster. Because the company uses a specific vintage coffee roaster that utilizes a cast iron skillet, it cannot convert to using one of the energy-efficient drum roasters currently on the market, according to Matt Lounsbury, the company’s manager of wholesale coffee sales.

Through a study conducted by Portland-based PAE Consulting Engineers, Stumptown discovered it could capture enough heat to warm its entire roastery and flagship café — and still have heat left over.

“Even if the building was a multi-story mixed-use building, we’d still have enough heat to heat the whole building,” Lounsbury says. Stumptown is evaluating whether or not it can supply power for the entire block, including future retail tenant build-outs.

Olympia, Wash.-based Batdorf & Bronson Coffee Roasters, which claims to be America’s first coffee company to run completely on clean power, installed a 2.2-kilowatt photovoltaic (PV) array on its headquarters in 1999 with help from a grant from the City of Olympia. Batdorf & Bronson reportedly purchases more than 250,000 kilowatt hours of Green Tags from the Bonneville Environmental Foundation to compensate for both the electricity and the natural gas it uses at its Olympia roastery, its Atlanta-based roastery and its retail locations in both cities.

The company, which received the Washington Governor’s Award in 2004 for pollution prevention and sustainable business practices, participates in the Western Washington Green Power awareness campaign, which in 2005 helped turn more than 5,000 customers on to green power. Batdorf & Bronson sent a free pound of coffee to each customer who signed up to purchase renewable energy during the campaign. To help seal the deal, Ashland, Ore.,-based Dagoba Organic Chocolate Co. tossed in a candy bar for each customer.

“Some people need a little sweetening to switch to green power, and we’re happy to provide it,” says Lois Maffeo, Batdorf & Bronson’s communications manager.

Batdorf & Bronson is a founding partner in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Green Power program, which has grown to include over 700 U.S. companies, nonprofit organizations and government agencies.

While no longer living in the Northwest, Oregon natives Michael and David Hartkop, along with business partner Nathan Krupa, rely entirely on the sun’s energy to crank out batches of Solar Roast. While living in Ashland, Ore., David devised a solar-powered coffee roaster that uses mirrors to concentrate solar thermal energy to heat the roaster to 550 degrees. After enduring many cloudy winter days in Bend, Ore., the trio moved in early 2007 to Pueblo, Colo., where the sun shines 323 days a year, according to the National Weather Service.

The company can roast up to three pounds of beans at a time, which is enough to supply its Pueblo café and fill Internet orders. With David working on a roaster that could roast up to 30 pounds of beans at a time, Solar Roast hopes to ramp up production by the end of 2007, according to Krupa.

The company is working to attain patents for its solar-powered roaster, but has no plans of selling the machines to other roasting companies, Krupa says.

Instead, the company wants to sell smaller versions of the solar-powered roaster to coffee-producing nations that are unable to afford the infrastructure for conventional coffee roasters.

“A lot of plantations have never tasted the coffee they produce,” Krupa says. “This could be an opportunity for them to improve the quality of their product. They could try it out before shipping it off.”