Fat Tire, Phat Sustainability

Who knew?  Perhaps my favorite beer is green…and it’s not even St Patrick’s Day!  I was watching the Sundance Channel’s program Big Ideas For A Small Planet last night (see video below) and they showcased the New Belgium Brewery in Fort Collins, Colorado.  I saw the New Belgium logo and started to salivate like a Pavlovian dog. 

I was first introduced to the deliciousness called Fat Tire, NBs top seller, when my brother lived in Denver about eight years ago.  When I came back to Illinois I was disappointed to learn that Fat Tire was not being sold east of the Mississippi River.  Every now and then, someone at work would go skiing or even to St Louis and ask me if I’ve ever had this beer called Fat Tire.  We’d talk about how great it was and how we wished that it was sold here.  Then, about two years ago, it showed up in Chicago.  I believe Chicago was the first city east of the Mississippi to get the beer.  It was only sold in 22oz bottles.  No 6-packs, 12-packs, or kegs.  Just 22oz bottles.  That lasted for 6-12mos.  Now you can find it regularly at any credible bar…and I am happy to  turn my dollars over.  So I’ve been this huge Fat Tire fan for years, and drinking it regularly (not too much, though - come on) ever since I’ve been able to get my hands on it locally.  I’ve never researched New Belgium Brewery, so I didn’t know just how great they were.  I guess we just kinda found each other.  It was love at first sight.  Fate.  Who knew we had common interests…like saving the world…and delicious beverages.

Now onto the reason for the post in the first place, sustainability.  New Belgium Brewery built their buildings with environmental stewardship on the front burners.  The owners and founders are Jeff Lebesch and Kim Jordan.  Kim explained that their brewery is very efficient and profitable which affords them the luxury to build the place the way they want to – which is environmentally sound.  Here are some examples of their efforts: 

• The warehouse is lit with solar sky light tubes
• The workspace isn’t air conditioned because the building is designed with a peaked “chimney” with windows at the top that let the warm air out keeping it comfortable.
• They switched to amonia instead of freon for cooling which cut their cooling system energy use in half.
• Wind energy is bought from the local power company to power the brewery
• 10% of the energy used in the brewery is created from methane gas made from waste in the beer making process
• Water reduction in the beer making process to around half the amount of water used versus the industry average
• Water reclamation onsite
• Sell waste product to farmers for grain to feed cattle

Lets talk about the water reclamation.  The website says it best, “Water is a key ingredient of beer. Water is also a key ingredient of life, ergo beer is a key ingredient of life (well – that’s a stretch, but it’s a mighty fine thing). Water conservation may well be the critical environmental concern in the western U.S. As brewers, we need to take that seriously. Through recapture and reuse, New Belgium uses less than four barrels of water to produce one barrel of beer, significantly less than the industry average.”

New Belgium Brewery is always looking into new ways to make their business better and greener.  This is one company that is not greenwashed.  They’re a company that maybe should profit from the trend – but they’re doing just fine on their own.

Watch an NBC video segment on America Goes Green with Brian Williams.

Big Ideas For A Small Planet 

Sources: New Belgium Brewery, Terrain.org, Sundance Channel