sustainable brewing

DB Brewing Timaru Transitions to Biomass Energy

DB Draught Brewery in Timaru has taken a big step towards DB's ambition of using 100% clean energy across its breweries by 2030.

DB Breweries' Timaru-based DB Draught Brewery has this month begun the process of transitioning to biomass energy, a cleaner and renewable energy source, for all its thermal energy needs in its breweries and cideries. This will see the site achieve a whopping 98 per cent reductino in carbon emissions from steam.

The brewery uses steam - sometimes called 'process heat' or 'thermal energy' - as an essential part of the brewing process. Like many other breweries, DB Draught had been sourcing this steam through the burning of coal. Over the course of 2021, the brewery will transition to biomass energy, a renewable energy that is generated using regionally-sourced sustainable woody residue, a by-product of the forestry industry. Since February 19th 2021, 60 per cent of the brewery's steam requirements will be met by biomass; this will increase to 100 per cent by October 2021.

Biomass600

"We set an ambitious goal to halve our carbon footprint by 2030 [from a 2018 baseline] as well as transition our entire energy footprint in production to clean energy sources," says DB Breweries Managing Director Peter Simons. "Moving to biomass at Timaru this year is a major carbon reduction project to help us reach these ambitious goals.

"Switching to biomass, and away from coal, will decrease DB's total carbon footprint by 28 per cent, as well as reduce thermal energy emissions at DB Draught Brewery by approximately 98 per cent - the equivalent to the average annual emissions of around 300 New Zealand households."

Reducing emissions is a key focus for DB Breweries and the Heineken company globally, which has a goal to reduce emissions in production by 70 per cent by 2030. DB began their sustainability journey in 2008, reducing production emissions by almost half between 2008 and 2018. In 2018, DB joined the Climate Leaders Coalition, developing a long-term sustainability strategy to 2030.