Biogas in the Brewery: An Exploration of Practice and Sustainability

RCN Conference Abstract - J. Jurado

In recent years, more breweries in the USA have installed anaerobic waste water treatment plants as an alternative to traditional aerobic plants. The biogas byproduct can be used as boiler or CHP fuel, and one brewery evaluated its use in fuel cell electricity generation. Admittedly, a ‘micro-’ scale biofuel solution which, at best, supplies 20% of the energy required by the brewery... yet which is like PV and solar heating applications in that individual adaptation may seem to be inconsequential, but industry-wide, it is additive and helps change energy benchmarks. A challenge has been to deploy anaerobic treatment systems for the burgeoning artisanal breweries. Once this technological approach was only viable for very large breweries, but then smaller regional breweries had successes with their implementations. The proliferation of new, very small breweries suggests that there exists a genuine opportunity for small-scale anaerobic digester systems. An exploration of successful existing installations lends a framework of what makes sense for smaller, unitized systems that must be more affordable for the small brewery. ROI is the final determinant which will be discussed from the lens of the brewery owner.