Gluten free beer brewed sustainably at TWØBAYS Brewing Co
Without world-class gluten free grains and hops from our agricultural partners, TWØBAYS gluten free beer won't exist.
So now, more than ever, we are acutely aware of the urgency to minimise our impact on our planet. We want to ensure we can continue to brew and drink great gluten free beer – forever!
Long before opening our Dromana Brewery, we knew that the nature of making beer is not the most environmentally friendly activity (a lot of water and energy is needed), so we put plans in place to minimise our impact.
Whilst there's a lot more to do (and we’re always working on it), we wanted to share with you what we have put in place so far...
Carbon Footprint
We've purchased carbon credits with Bimbadeen Phillip Island (just across Western Port Bay from the Brewery). The drone photograph below shows Paddocks M4 and M14 where the 117 tonnes of CO2 we've paid for is safely captured and stored, helping our local community to make Phillip Island totally renewable by 2030.
We're continuing to better understand our carbon footprint, and plan to investigate ways to further reduce the impact we have in both the freight and logistics part of the business – and also throughout the brewing process!
Beer and sun are the perfect couple!
The majority of brewing happens during daylight hours, and the majority of drinking occurs in summer! In December 2020, we installed a 33.54kW rooftop solar system, comprising 86 solar panels. Six months in, this had saved more than 10,000 kilograms of CO2 – the equivalent of planting almost 300 trees.
And we've taken more steps towards carbon neutrality by signing an agreement with GreenPower. They will now supply the electricity when we can't generate enough power from our roof-top solar system to brew great gluten free beer – and keep it cold!
GreenPower sources all its energy from renewable power sources, and we will now save more than 60 tonnes of CO2 in our production process.
Livestock love spent beer grain
Since our very first attempt at what is now a gold medal-winning Pale Ale, we’ve had our spent malt picked up by local farmers – within a 25-kilometre radius – who use it to feed their livestock. That’s almost 85 tonnes of grain (the average weight of a Killer Whale) put to great use! We also send the food scraps from our Taproom to a local farm for them to feed their chickens and goats.
Aluminium is top of glass
TWØBAYS made a decision from the start to avoid using glass in any part of our business. In a previous life, Richard (our Founder) worked in the waste industry and saw the mountains of glass already waiting to be recycled – so we decided to avoid adding to the stockpile! We use aluminium cans to share our precious beer outside of the Taproom for a number of reasons, including:
- they're just better for the beer! No oxygen or light can enter a can after it’s sealed which ensures the beer will last longer and the hops continue to provide their amazing aromas;
- it’s lighter and stronger for transporting, which means we can get more beer onto a single pallet and reduce fuel economy on the road; and
- it's fully (and indefinitely) recyclable and saves 95% of the energy required to make new aluminium. Every aluminium beer can you recycle, saves enough energy to power a television set for three hours!
Even the wines and cider served in our Taproom are poured from a keg, so we don’t have any glass waste!
Holding the beers together
The blue lids that hold our 4-packs together are made by PakTech®. They are 100% recycled material and 100% recyclable – so please make sure you put them in the right bin!
Single use sucks
We don’t use any single-use glass or plastic items (including straws and single-use cutlery) in our Taproom; we use cloth washes and towels, and we also try to keep paper to a minimum, choosing digital alternatives if possible.
We use BioPak compostable tasting cups when we attend events, and encourage responsible disposal of the cups, or we pay to dispose of the used cups appropriately.
Right down to the toilet paper we choose, and the recycled (and recyclable) Envirocare stock on which we print our business cards, TWØBAYS is considering our planet in each and every action.
So, what’s next??
Trub to compost
In the next couple of months, our trub will start to be taken by a local farmer (less than 20 kilometres away) to enrich their compost. Trub, from the German word meaning ‘sediment’, is a collective term covering sediments formed in the brewing process (including hop residues and smaller malt particles). It happens to have great fertilising properties too!
Pallet Wrapping
We know that tonnes of pallet wrapping are sent to landfill every day (not that much by us!) so we’re currently in conversations with an exciting local manufacturer - Great Wrap - who is looking to produce industrial pallet wrapping out of waste potatoes which will break down in compost in under 180 days – that’s faster than an orange peel!
We look forward to letting you know more when these exciting projects come to life!
