After working at the New Belgium Brewing Company in Fort Collins, Colo., for a year, employees receive a new cruiser bike.
The gift represents the company's flagship brew, Fat Tire Ale, and reflects the company's focus on environmentally friendly technologies that extends to its energy-efficient brewing processes. The company's mission statement also reflects this focus, stating its goal "to operate a profitable company which is socially, ethically, and environmentally responsible, that produces high quality beer true to Belgian brewing styles."
Award-winning efficiency
This focus recently earned the company a Corporate Energy Management Award from the Rocky Mountain Chapter of the Association of Energy Engineers. The award recognizes company founder Jeffrey Lebesch's passion for saving energy - a passion that may stem from his previous career as an electrical engineer. His goal is a zero-emission brewery.
The plant takes advantage of natural light, cutting the electricity needed for artificial lighting. The facility's warehouse has "light pipes," skylight-type openings that enhance natural lighting.
This feature is just one way the brewery saves energy used for lighting. It also uses low-energy fluorescent lights and motion detectors to switch off lights when people leave rooms.
Air circulating from outside cools beer in the warehouse during winter months, and steam used to heat the beer during the brewing process heats water that circulates through the building to heat the floor. Plans are under way to heat tubes under the concrete loading dock with waste heat from the refrigeration system compressor to melt snow.
A heat exchanger in the kettle vent stack condenses vapor and heats incoming water to the required brewing temperature. A heat exchanger extracts heat from wort (unfermented beer), reducing the temperature to fermentation levels. These two heat recovery sources generate enough hot water for all brewing and some cleaning requirements.
During fermentation, the fermentation tanks require cooling. This currently accounts for a large percentage of the brewery's energy use. New Belgium soon will try out an ammonia refrigerant that is expected to reduce the cooling equipment's energy consumption by half.
A computer system tracks energy use and identifies equipment that can be shut down during periods of peak energy demand.
Water conservation
The brewery's emphasis on environmentally friendly processes doesn't end with energy use. It also recycles water resources. One system captures and reuses water and detergents used to clean tanks between brews. The final rinse water is used to begin the next round of cleaning.
The company plans to capture 451,000 gallons of water a year from its bottling process for use in irrigating the lawn. New Belgium is also building holding tanks where waste water can neutralize before being sent into city sewers.
Using waste products to create new products may also be part of the brewery's future. A greenhouse is being designed, with a goal of using carbon dioxide produced in the brewery process to grow plants. And the brewery is also looking into ways of using spent grain, including growing mushrooms, raising earthworms, or composting.
The company continues to seek ways of maximizing resources. It is looking at subscribing to Fort Collins Utilities' wind power program.
The New Belgium Brewing Company began in 1991 in the basement of the home of Lebesch and his wife, Kim Jordan. In those days it produced eight and a half barrels of beer a week.
Today, the plant employs more than 67 people and produces between 2,000 and 3,000 barrels of beer per week. The brewery continues to grow, but there are no plans to expand outside the Rocky Mountain area. That's because burning fossil fuels for cross-country transportation wouldn't fit with the company's focus on efficient resource use .
According to Jordan, "Part of this craft brewing renaissance is about drinking fresh products. I sincerely hope there will be more breweries in smaller towns around the United States just like there were when my grandmother lived. Her husband, who was a brewer in St. Louis, took the beer bucket down to the corner to get their daily beer. I think that is exciting and desirable."
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WEBSITE(S):New Belgium Brewing Co.
FROM WESTERN'S POWER LINE:Ensuring Energy Efficiency in the WorkplaceBuilding Commissioning for New ConstructionOperation and Maintenance Best Practices for Energy-Efficiency Buildings
For more information, call Ryan Trail at (970) 221-0524. |
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