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<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\nThe Sierra Nevada Brewing Co is the third largest small and independent American craft brewer in the States and prides itself on its approach to sustainability, regularly passing up the chance to brew more easily and cheaply. At the main site in Chico, California, there are 3.5 football fields worth of solar panels that work in tandem with two megawatts of Capstone microturbines to provide over 90% of the electricity needed to run the brewery. Waste heat is captured and used to make steam and hot water for the brewing process. Instead of venting naturally produced CO2 from fermentation, Sierra Nevada recovers it, cleans it and sends it back into the brewery to pressurise tanks and assist in packaging. Recovered CO2 contains less oxygen than commercial CO2, thus improving the quality of the beer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Water conservation is crucial in drought-stricken California and Sierra Nevada has eliminated water-based lubricants on the bottling and kegging lines, which not only reduces water consumption but also wastewater heading to the on-site treatment plant. The brewery recovers water used to rinse bottles prior to filling for use in the vacuum pumps that dispense beer into bottles, saving about 2.5 million gallons of water annually. This environmental stewardship is at the forefront of Sierra Nevada\u2019s core values and as important as making great beer. Mandi McKay, the brewery\u2019s director of sustainability and social responsibility comments, \u201cWe have excelled at the philosophy of closed loop sustainability and it\u2019s proven to be a wonderful operating strategy. We\u2019ve shown that waste coming out of one process such as heat, water or CO2 recovery can become a resource for something else. We\u2019re very energy intensive in the brewing industry, we make a lot of heat and we use a lot of heat so we\u2019ve gone all in on recovering heat and steam and that closed loop philosophy has been a guiding principle for us. At Sierra Nevada we do a lot more than just brew amazing beer and the same commitment to continuous improvement and zero waste runs across the board. We\u2019ve always been interested in connecting ourselves with our supply chain; early on we planted our own hop field and that comes from the fundamental belief that everything is connected and our impact on the environment is impacting ourselves<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n FIRESTONE WALKER BREWING CO<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Also based in California, Firestone Walker built their sustainability strategy on three main tenets: solar energy, eliminating waste and conserving water. The site is home to an impressive 9.5 acre solar array that moves with the sun and generates the majority of energy needed by the brewery. It offsets about 3,000 metric tonnes of carbon emissions annually or the same carbon footprint as a 4,000 acre forest. Matt Brynildson, brewmaster at Firestone Walker explains, \u201cEverything involved in the brewing process \u2013 hops, malted grains \u2013 comes from farms and you learn through that process the importance of sustainable business practice. When farmers practise more sustainably, the hops get better and it makes better business sense. We\u2019ve always collected spent grains and sent them off to farmers as feed but as we\u2019ve grown we\u2019ve improved our processes by separating our yeast streams from our spent grain streams, allowing us to send those streams to different farms for different purposes. We feed more than 20 million pounds of spent grains annually to local livestock and 90% of brewing grains are delivered in bulk to eliminate packaging waste. Water is a precious resource in California and it takes 5 to 7 gallons of water to make one gallon of beer. The beer goes out to the community and the rest of that water is processed in our waste water plant and effluent system, allowing us to regain some energy from it. Ultimately, we\u2019re discharging water that\u2019s in better shape than before. We treat 35 million gallons of process water annually on site and return it to the local aquifer. The more we brew and the more raw materials we use, the greater the responsibility we have to use those materials wisely and it\u2019s not just about the bottom line, it\u2019s about doing the right thing<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n FREMONT BREWING CO<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Fremont in Seattle, Washington, is making a name for itself as a sustainable brewery by using a \u2018Salmon Safe\u2019 certification on one of its beers, Cowiche Canyon Fresh Hop Ale. Founder Matt Lincecum, explains, \u201cThe Cowiche Farm is a joint project between Fremont and farmers from the Yakima Chief Hops team. We started this collaboration 12 years ago to develop organic hop varieties, methodologies of growing and harvesting and to show the craft beer world that organic hops are some of the very best hops. Several years ago, we were certified Salmon Safe and are extremely proud of this accomplishment for the Cowiche farm. We believe that including the logo on the packaging has boosted the brewery\u2019s visibility and perhaps sales<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sustainability is a huge part of the brewing process: water isn\u2019t heated with natural gas but with steam, which captures heat from the brew kettles during production and redirects it to the hot water tank. Excess liquid is filtered into drainage, while the grains are captured and donated to feed local cows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sustainability is a core value for the vast majority of American craft brewers, as is the pursuit of quality, borne out by the number of medals and top honours American craft beer wins at prestigious international beer competitions. One of the key reasons behind its success internationally is the proximity to the freshest examples of highly-sought after hop varieties. By visiting the hop fields themselves, American craft brewers are able to develop flavour profiles in beer that are difficult to control elsewhere. Combine quality and freshness of raw materials with the brewers\u2019 technical expertise and it\u2019s easy to see why American craft beer is renowned for its quality the world over.<\/p>\n\n\n But does the beer drinker care if their beer is made responsibly or not? Some may claim that general awareness and demand isn\u2019t high enough yet but this could change. A study from Indiana University, Iowa, in 2018, albeit of a limited sample size, found that the \u2018majority of beer consumers are willing to pay more for sustainable beer\u2019. People who already purchase premium beer and who chose other environmentally friendly goods and services are most likely to pay extra for sustainably produced beer. Whether this translates into a full-scale change across the brewing landscape remains to be seen but it is a small step in the right direction. Sustainability is becoming increasingly important globally. The American craft beer industry emits about half a billion metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere annually and is all too aware… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3284,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3283"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3283\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3286,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3283\/revisions\/3286"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
SIERRA NEVADA BREWING CO<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/image-10.png\")
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L<\/em>otte Peplow<\/em><\/strong>
The Brewers Association (BA) is a not-for-profit trade association dedicated to small and independent American brewers, their beers and the community of brewing enthusiasts. Lotte is their American Craft Beer Ambassador for Europe. You can find out more at www.brewersassociation.org.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"