An estimated 500-billion coffee cups are made globally each year. Most end up in the garbage, filling up landfills. However, a new company in Germany has found a way to tackle the problem. CGTN's Natalie Carney has more from Munich.

For some, Coffee is synonymous with breathing. Some simply can't start their day without a cup or two, even when on the go. But what then do you do with that disposable cup? Coffee cups are the second-biggest cause of litter behind plastic bottles. Even many of the cups placed in recycling bins end up in landfills, where they take up to 30 years to break down/decompose. Their inner plastic lining is difficult to recycle by normal systems. Producing these disposable cups also lands a hefty blow to our environment. So to tackle this issue, the Munich-based company Re-Cup has come up with a practical solution: a reusable deposit system for coffee-to-go cups.

FABIEN ECKERT RE-CUP CO-FOUNDER "We thought it would be nice to replace disposable cups with some kind of deposit system so that me as a customer, I can go to a coffee shop, pay a 1 euro deposit for the reusable cup. Take it with me and then just drop the cup wherever I go and get my deposit back so that's the idea."

Re-Cup is the first of its kind in Germany, which has a problem with cups like almost every other country in the world.

NATALIE CARNEY MUNICH "Every year in Germany alone about 2.8 billion disposable cups are used and thrown away after a single use. That's 320,000 cups per hour. Re-Cup has the potential of eliminating an entire landfill if used on a regular basis."

Kiosk 1917 was one of the first to join the Re-cup revolution.

JOHANNES BAYERLEIN MANAGER OF KIOSK 1917 "Decisive is to be part of the project, to be sustainable and the image to clients or the customers have of your place. We were one of the first places to have the re-cup in Munich so it's really nice to be part of the movement."

And that "movement" appears to be catching on.

FABIEN ECKERT RE-CUP CO-FOUNDER "Well we started last year with 50 shops in Munich, 50 coffee shops and gas stations and different providers of coffee to go. And right now we have 750 shops Germany wide basically. We started in Munich went to Berlin, Cologne we are even on Sylt, which is a small island in northern Germany."

In addition to helping the environment, it also seems to be helping business, says Johannes.

JOHANNES BAYERLEIN MANAGER OF KIOSK 1917 "For us it's a really good instrument for clients coming back and giving their cup back. And having a daily routine. Using their re-cup.  So for us it's also, apart from the topic of sustainability, for us it's 'also a really good instruments to bind to clients more or less."

Similar programs are picking up around the world, such as in neighboring France who are the first country to ban all disposable food take away items, including coffee cups by 2020. Germany too appears to be on a path towards more sustainable living, with companies like Re-cup leading the way.