A Tour of the New Belgium Brewery - Act One

While bumming around Fort Collins, Colorado, LiveGreen had the chance to meet with New Belgium Brewery's Sustainability Specialist Nicolas Theisen for a tour. New Belgium is not your average brewery. Along with making beer, the creators of Fat Tire are pushing the envelope of sustainable business development while incubating a culture of eccentric genius. Come with us as we take you through the first part of our journey through Nirvana.

First stop is an explanation of the Process Water Treatment Facility where waste water from the brewery is pumped into anaerobic (without oxygen) and aerobic (whith oxygen) ponds to reduce the amount of organic waste and water sent on to the Fort Collins municipal plant. Initially built in 2001, the facility was expanded last year to double its capacity. The ponds harness the power of a diverse set of microbes to reduce organic waste. A balloon placed over the anaerobic pond captures methane released from bacteria degrading the organic waste which is then used to power a combined heat and power engine. Last year, New Belgium ran the engine for six months to produce 400,000 kW of electricity. At full load, there is a potential output of 100,000 kWh per month which could meet 15% of the brewery’s needs for electricity.

Step along to Brew House One. Not used anymore for daily brewing, there are plans to use this original brew house for specialty brews or to handle overflow from Brew House Two. Brew House Two is a bit loud and hot because this is where the magic happens. Everyday, three truck loads of grain are used for brewing. The amount of energy needed to heat the large volumes of water used at New Belgium is drastically lower than normal breweries. On the ground floor of Brew House Two can be found heat exchangers that use counter flow technology to save energy in the form of hot water. By passing the hot wort (unfermented beer) next to cold water coming in to be heated, the hot wort warms the cold water, thereby reducing the amount of energy needed to boil the water as well as cooling the wort, which reduces the energy needed to cool the wort. Water is one of the most energy taxing molecules to heat or cool, so using water as a type of energy battery is very efficient. This is just one way in which New Belgium uses heat exchangers. Another heat exchanger uses glycol to capture heat which is then used to heat the loading docks to eliminate the need for deicing.

Come up the stairs to a pavilion on top of the three huge brew tanks. It’s even hotter up here…we’re standing on top of huge tanks heated to 200 degrees Fahrenheit. This area is used for tours and entertaining. The brewery opens the pavilion up 10 times a year for local non-profit organizations to hold events and provides catering and a New Belgium bike to raffle. All free of charge. This is all part of the New Belgium philanthropic and sustainable attributes. Employee-owned, New Belgium contributes $1 for each barrel sold to a philanthropic cause within its distribution zone. This resulted in $400,000 last year alone. With a doubling in capacity expected this year, New Belgium could donate almost one million dollars next year! Check out the website to apply.

At 400,000 barrels per year, New Belgium is the third largest craft brewery (15,000 to 2 million barrels per year) in America today, surpassed only by Sierra Nevada and Sam Adams. A new packaging facility coming online right now is excepted to double this number. Truly amazing when you hear that back in 1992, New Belgium started in the basement of founders’ Jeff Lebesch and Kim Jordan's house.

So, how is this magical elixir made? Nic took us through the process as we looked into the first tank.

This is our mill, we have all of our grain silos out back. We get three truckloads of grain a day. As it comes in we mill it and put it in here with hot water. At this point, the hot water is breaking down the starches into fermentable sugars. It’s just like a hot cereal with barley, sometimes oats or wheat…we don’t use rice or corn. This is what really effects the product that comes out. The heat of the water and how long you keep it in the tank changes the amount of sugars available. It’s not only the ingredients that effect beer, it’s also the process.

Come on over to the second tank where Nic points out a mosaic surrounding the tank.


These mosaics are done by a local artist. New Belgium likes to support local artists…all of our labels are done by local artists. This mosaic is “A Day in the Life of a New Belgium Employee”. They get up, go on a bike ride…check it out. This tank is the Lauter Tun, lauter is german for straining. This is where we’re going to separate all that grain from the liquid. This grain is by far our largest waste product. We get three truck loads in a day and three truck loads out. This by-product is sent to a local feed lot and is a great example of a closed loop system.

Over to the last tank which is the prized energy saving design, the Merlin Brewing Vessel.


The brewing process is by far the highest energy use of the brewery. Nothing compares to heating all of this water, so the more energy you can capture, such as in the energy transfer plates, the better. This is an example of using less energy. You’re bringing the wort up to very high temperatures for multiple reasons. One is to sanitize the beer, so when you add the yeast there is no contamination. Two, you boil off impurities which in this case are in the form of aromas. This doesn’t effect the taste really, but can save your beer from smelling foul. And then three, this is where we’ll add herbs and spices as well as the hops. High temperatures are needed to get the flavors out.

The standard way of heating is a jacketed tank that heats the liquid from the outside. What we use is a cone and a quarter inch of liquid is poured down the cone which flash boils it. This instantly boils the wort, what would normally take hours takes minutes to heat. So we save 65-75% of the natural gas needed to heat it. And then, rather than piping that steam out, which is energy, we have a copper coil running through there to condense and capture the water which is then used to clean the tanks as well as capturing the heat.

Having fun? This place is awesome. Here we stop for a taste of New Belgium’s seasonal beer, Springboard Ale. While at the bar, a tour invades and the host starts a funky music video…watch it here!




Talking with Nic, he tells me of plans to start generating even more power onsite using wind and solar. The brewery is situated on the northern end of town and has a great wind potential from Wyoming.

That ends this part of the tour...check back soon for our next segment!