Earlier in the summer in my Beer 101 column for Sherbrooke Liquor, I began a three part series on beer and the environment. Parts I & II (here is the onbeer post summarizing both) looked at the carbon footprint of beer in general and at the age-old bottle vs. can debate.
However, I promised when I started the series that I wouldn’t do the standard enviro-thing and leave you all depressed and feeling everything is hopeless and we are doomed ecologically (we might be, but I didn’t want to end on that note). So, the third part looks at environmental success stories – practical, real things breweries are doing to make their operations more sustainable and earth-friendly. You can read Part III here.
I find I have been growing weary of breweries bragging about how they send their spent grain to local farmers to feed cattle, and how they capture fugitive heat and use it for secondary purposes. It is not that those are bad things – they are indeed good things – but it is just that almost EVERYBODY does that these days. It makes good business sense as much as it helps the planet. Organic ingredients also make a difference, but that still feels like a rather simple shift.
Instead I wanted to look at breweries that have gone the next step, who have made significant investments in making their breweries greener. I actually found quite a number of breweries who have taken serious steps to reduce their environmental footprint – something that makes me feel quite optimistic, actually. In the column I point to Steam Whistle’s bio-diesel trucks and to Anderson Valley’s solar panel array.
I pay most attention to two breweries – Alaskan Brewing and New Belgium. I choose them both because they deserve it (they may be leaders in North America. on this front) but also because their particular initiatives are just plain cool! Alaskan’s spent grain-fueled boiler and mash filter press are simply genius. I love that not only is their mash filter press less-resource intensive, it actually has a higher conversion efficiency.
And then there is New Belgium. I likely am giving them too much exposure, really, but it is hard to write an article about green initiatives and NOT talk about their smart energy system and bio-gas water treatment and go-generation plant. They are the closest brewery on the planet (that I am aware of) to being carbon neutral. That deserves a few column inches, I think.
In short, folks, we are not screwed. If the ground-breaking innovations of breweries like Alaskan and New Belgium filter through the rest of the industry, then we have the potential of making the world of beer making truly sustainable. And wouldn’t that be a good thing for our grand kids when they hit drinking age?
September 2, 2014 at 8:56 AM
I believe Sierra Nevada is right up there with New Belgium in regards to being carbon neutral, but they don’t brag about it as much.
September 2, 2014 at 7:08 PM
Yeah, I believe you are right Mark. I came here to mention them. Some of the stuff I’ve read about Sierra Nevada’s water conservation blows me away, easily one of the best in the industry.
Mash filters are a tough one. They do have great extraction and water efficiency. But on the other hand, the flavour/sugar profile of the wort produced is different from a lauter tun. It would be hard for a brewery to move to a mash filter and maintain the flavour profiles of their beer. Not that it would be impossible, but very difficult. I’ve seen a few new breweries get them, a place where adhering to a specification doesn’t exist. In the world of distilling, where high efficiencies rule, whisky distillers have tested mash filters, but not adopted them. I can’t remember the specifics, but it had to do with the flavour profile.
The other interesting thing is that the new high tech lauter tuns (Steinecker and GEA for example) are nearing 100% efficiency. They are also getting drier spent grains than older lauter tun designs, but not nearly as dry as a mash filter can get them. So, if you are big enough (50hL+ knockouts) and can afford high end stuff, the efficiency advantage of mash filters starts to diminish.
All in all, I think mash filters have their place in the industry. At the small scale, where fancy lauter tun’s don’t exist, I think they will continue to grow in popularity. There are many breweries where mash filters make sense. They either operate on limited sewers/the cost of drainage is very high or water is a very scarce resource. The demand is there at the small scale, several companies are producing mash filters in the 10-20hL knockout range.
Also, that’s quite the interesting fact about New Belgium auditing Rahr… it’s very nice to see the large guys use their weight for good.
September 3, 2014 at 4:24 PM
Okay, you have officially blown past my knowledge base!! Thanks for this, although I will admit to only following part of what you say about mash filters, high tech lauter tuns, etc. (I get the basics, just not the science). I am really glad you and Mark have highlighted other examples. Maybe I have become New Belgium smitten, but at least they still have the worker-owned thing no one else can claim 🙂 .
September 4, 2014 at 6:42 AM
They are claiming you can get last runnings in the neighbourhood of 0.5 plato. Traditionally, polyphenol extraction would be a problem. They have figured out a way to not extract polyphenols when going that low. I don’t quite get how that is possible, so we’re both in the dark on it.
September 4, 2014 at 8:55 AM
As I mentioned in the last post, I recently toured the New Belgium facility. I have an interesting picture of their power meter showing about 40% of their power usage that day being generated in-house. But what really surprised me was that all their fermenters are vented directly to the atmosphere! They buy all the CO2 they need for processing. That’s one big carbon footprint right there (and they are about 5 times our size!) We are at 70% recovery and working hard to improve it.
As for lauter tuns versus mash filters, we were considering replacing our 1950’s era lauter tun with a Meura mash filter. However, there are a few of us who are now campaigning for a new lauter tun based on information from Alaskan Brewing’s experience.
September 4, 2014 at 10:31 AM
Anyone interested in the difference between mash filtered vs. lautered beers could easily pay to have the Canadian Malting Barley Technical Research Institute here in Winnipeg run a test batch. They do have both technologies in house already, side by side.