Workers at a coffee roasting plant in Texas were getting sick. The issue first caught the attention of investigators at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention back in 2012. People at home grinding or brewing up a pot need not worry, but the chemical could pose a danger to people working in commercial coffee roasting plants. Now it looks like that chemical could affect the coffee world as well. You might remember hearing about diacetyl several years ago, when a synthetic version of the chemical, which is used to give a buttery flavor to certain snack foods, was implicated in causing severe lung problems among workers at a microwave popcorn facility. Why are these gases so worrisome? Because they contain a chemical called diacetyl - a natural byproduct of the coffee roasting process that, in large concentrations, can infiltrate the lungs and cause a severe form of lung disease. So it is really grabbing a lot of all of the gases coming off the coffee," he explains. He points to a cooling can that is "designed to draw air from the room over the beans and exhausts that air out of the facility. Moon says he aims to run an efficient and safe plant - and that starts the minute beans spill out of the roaster. Step into Mike Moon's Madison, Wis., coffee roasting plant and the aroma of beans - from Brazil to Laos - immediately washes over you. Mike De Sisti/Milwaukee Journal Sentinel/TNS via Getty Images The glass tube on his vest tests the air in his breathing zone for diacetyl, a chemical byproduct of the coffee roasting process that can cause lung disease. Just Coffee Cooperative's Benjamin Lisser prepares to grind coffee.
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