St. Patrick’s Day is here, in all its viridescent ebriety. However, St. Patrick’s Day is the only time of year when the beer is green. Any beer-brewing professionals would chuckle at the thought of sustainable beer brands. Beer-brewing is as wasteful as it gets.
Beer brewing was a polluting business until the last decade. With more people becoming aware of the devastating effects of climate change and pollution, beer-brewing businesses have been trying to remedy the highly polluting sector.
This St. Patrick’s Day, discover which four sustainable beer brands have the greenest brewing recipes with Tenere.
Anderson Valley Brewing Company
For over 30 years, Anderson Valley Brewing Company has been in the business of hand-crafting its own ales and lagers. With balanced IPAs, patiently barrel-aged bottlings, and industry-leading goses, Anderson Valley Brewing Company enjoys astonishing longevity in the beer brewing business.
What makes Anderson Valley Brewing Company green:
- With a solar array that provides 40% of their electricity needs, the Anderson Valley Brewing Company is one of the first breweries in the US to apply sustainable energy to their business.
- The brewery is also committed to reusing 100% of its wastewater. This drastically reduces the negative impacts of untreated wastewater on the environment.
- Spent ingredients like grains are used as fertilizers and compost for their ingredients.
Anderson Valley Brewing Company’s must-try products:
With top lining products like their signature bourbon Barl Series, the year-round multi-flavor Gose, and the dark, rich, and woody Gatlin Damnosus Sour Barleywine, you can soothe your thirst for alcohol here.
Sierra Nevada’s North Carolina brewery
From the colder region of North Carolina, the Sierra Nevada’s North Carolina brewery is booming in sustainability. Since the 1970s, it has offered the US quality alcoholic beverages, keeping us happy and just a bit hammered.
What makes Sierra Nevada brewery so green:
- Using its 2651 hours of sunshine per year, the Sierra Nevada’s North Carolina brewery became one of the greenest breweries. With their large field of over 10,750 solarvoltaic panels, the majority of their power source comes directly from the sun.
- With the CO2 recovery system, the Sierra Nevada of North Carolina captures most of its emissions. The system, capable of handling 700 kilograms per hour (kg/hr), pushes the breweries towards the highest quality standards of their food-grade CO2.
- Sierra Nevada’s boilers, fuel cells, and brew kettles have heat recovery units integrated into their designs. The design reclaims waste heat instead of venting it, lowering the temperature of the area.
- Its ASBR systems are particularly efficient at handling high COD and brewery waste. Their process leaves minimum biomass loss and no separate clarifier required. This reduces their toxic byproducts into the environment.
Sierra Nevada’s North Carolina brewery must-try products:
The brewery is famous for its intensely aromatic Pale Ale, which infuses the sense of mountainous pine trees with tropical citrus. Other popular products include Seasonal and Torpedo Extra ales. All sold in packs.
Kona Brewing Co.
With 25 years of history, Kona Brewing Co. has successfully reinvented its signature drink time and time again – the American favorite from the islands of Hawaii. To craft an authentic Hawaiian beer and give back to its generous community, Kona Brewing Co. ventured into sustainability.
What makes Kona Brewing Co. brewery so green:
- Kona Brewing Co.’s innovative canning line can produce up to 200,00 kegs per year. This eliminates the need to import cans from the mainland. This keeps the carbon dioxide from shipping to a minimum.
- The Kona Resource Recovery Center is an on-site wastewater treatment center. It allows the brewery to cleanse all effluent water instead of allowing it to enter the sewage system. Runoff water filtered through a bioswale will hydrate their vegetation while also purifying the water. As a result, 50 percent of the water they consume each year won’t have to come from the city.
- The brewery also has an ingenious way of handling byproducts. Some of the leftover grain from beer-brewing is used as animal feed by nearby cattle farmers. Some is even used in the pub’s pizza dough.
- Other than its solar panel-covered roof, some of the byproducts are converted into a mulch-like material that emits methane. The methane produced will aid in the production of heat for the brewing process, resulting in a sustainable energy loop.
Kona Brewing Co.‘s must-try products:
The brand has many quality drinks. However, its crisp, easy-drinking Longboard Island Lager and floral and crushable Big Wave Golden Ale are still the best compared to other sustainable beer brands.
Heineken
Producing some 1.4 million bottles of beer every day and as one of the most popular beer brands worldwide, Heineken’s signature green bottle can be spotted anywhere. An American favorite, this Dutch brand is what many would gulp down for a quick buzz.
What makes Heineken brewery so green:
- Heineken has multiple sustainable heat sources. Thanks to its massive solar panel site, 3% of the brewery’s heat source now comes directly from the sun. A further 35% is provided via a fairly large biomass district heating system from Mayr-Meinhof. Finally, 10 percent of the heat is produced by their onsite wastewater treatment plant.
- Heineken smartly processes their spent grain instead of dumping it directly into the environment. Their onsite spent-grain fermentation tank produces enough biogas to provide 50% of the brewery’s energy needs.
- The steam generated from heating water in the brewing process is also utilized in cleaning bottles. This lowers both the brewery water and the energy needed from the conventional heat sterilizing process.
- While most of the spent grain is used to produce biogas, a small leftover amount is used as fertilizer. This reduces their need for chemical fertilizers.
Heineken’s must-try products:
While the brand Heineken is synonymous with beer for many, it does offer other alcoholic beverages, most notably ciders. However, if you are of legal age, stick to their beer; it’s way better.
Beer-brewing is still one of the most pollutive sectors right now, despite substantial technological advancements in the last 20 years. Whether it’s energy use, water consumption, or by-product waste, the sector has to overcome huge obstacles before reaching sustainability.
The beer sector can still be green, and not just for St. Patrick’s Day. By prioritizing products from sustainable beer brands, your beer can be green all year round. No matter how hard you like your drinks, your choices in sustainable shopping can positively affect the environment.
For every beer purchase made on Tenere, a donation will go to help global reforestation. Use your drinking power for good and contribute to climate change efforts with your favorite beers with us.
