All That Is Not Beer: Reducing Wastewater at Maine Breweries
A lot has changed since Robin and Alan Lapoint bought Geary Brewing in 2017. If folks who visited five years ago returned now, they would discover rows of shiny, new closed fermenters, brought in for all the new yeasts used to make Geary’s contemporary lineup of beers. The centrifuge might catch the eye (and ears) of visitors as it noisily separates yeast and hops particles from fresh beer. In the packaging room, new canning and bottling lines are saving time and money by reducing spillage and breakage.
But the most important changes at Geary Brewing are the least visible. Every step of their production process has been refined to reduce the impact of their wastewater downstream. These improvements earned Geary Brewing the Best Management Practices designation from the Portland Water District — surely the least flashy, but most commendable, distinction a brewery can earn around here.
Most of us beer drinkers only think about wastewater when our bladders are bursting and the line to the restroom is unbearably long. But producing beer not only creates more waste than its consumption does; wastewater from production is generally more concentrated with organic solids and caustic chemicals. (That is, unless you’ve been drinking some really turbid triple IPAs and viciously acidic kettle sours.)
The Best Management Practices classification exempts Geary Brewing from requirements that it sample and report on its wastewater every quarter. In other words, Geary Brewing has so consistently kept its wastewater within the limits that they can be trusted to regulate themselves. Some smaller breweries may be just as responsible, but were already exempt from those rules because their wastewater output falls below the industrial usage level...(Read the full article here)
