The champagne has been placed on ice as it’s the coffee and tea drinkers in Killarney that have cause to celebrate following a stunning hat-trick of victories.
Less than a year after it was initiated, the ground-breaking Killarney Coffee Cup project has scooped three national awards in recognition of its remarkable achievement of preventing over 506,000 single-use cups from going to landfill or being discarded in the national park.
First up on the honours list was the Best Environmental/Ecological Category prize at the Local Authority Members’ Association (LAMA) All-Ireland Community and Council Awards.
The awards celebrate communities and councils working together, highlighting the great work done and recognising the phenomenal contribution made.
This was closely followed when Outsider Magazine selected the coffee cup project for the Eco Hero accolade while the Killarney initiative also won a major prize at the Bord na Mona sponsored Irish Green Awards.
The Eco Hero citation acknowledged that, previously, the town went through about 23,000 single-use cups a week – more than a million a year – adding up to 18.5 tonnes of waste but now other Irish towns want to follow in Killarney’s footsteps.
In the Green Awards, the Killarney project scooped the Green Transformation Award and, in doing so, overcame stiff challenges from big players of the calibre of Aldi Ireland, Boston Scientific, Coca Cola and DPD Ireland.
The latter award was presented by Environment Minister, Eamon Ryan, at a black tie gala in the Clayton Burlington Hotel in Dublin.
The three victories were brought about as a result of the magnificent community effort by the businesses and people of Killarney and visitors who support the campaign to end single-use coffee cup use in the town.
There are now well in excess of 50 hospitality businesses signed up to and fully supportive of the coffee cup project and the local primary and secondary schools are also involved in sustainability projects spearheaded by the coffee cup project team.
In the summer of 2023, Killarney became the first town in Ireland, and one of only a handful worldwide, to ban the use of single use coffee cups and it is estimated that the prevention of over half a million cups in the period from July to December last year saved over 870,000 litres of water and 279 trees.
Louise Byrne, Sustainability Manager with the Killarney Park and The Ross Hotels, thanked everybody in Killarney for playing their part and for helping to put the town on the map as a national leader in sustainability practice.
In the summer of 2023, Killarney became the first town in Ireland, and one of only a handful worldwide, to ban the use of single use coffee cups.
