Climate for beer – beer for climate, meaning Kompania Piwowarska for the environment.

Every year, Global Footprint Network determines the date of Earth Overshoot Day, when humanity’s demand for ecological resources exceeds what Earth can regenerate naturally. Form that day on, we are maintaining our ecological deficit, and as we know – there is no planet B. Therefore, environmental protection is a necessity and at the same time one of current business megatrends. Over the next few years, it will have a great impact on the competitiveness of companies, and even their survival on the market. Kompania Piwowarska, the leader of the beer market in Poland, fits in with that trend, by executing its business strategy based on the rules of sustainable development. In practice, it translates to a number of initiatives aimed at reduction of the company’s footprint. 

The basis of Kompania Piwowarska’s business strategy is sustainable development, while the company’s ambition is to execute its business goals, while simultaneously contributing to achieving 13 out of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SGDs) set out by the UN within “Agenda 2030”. This approach is also in line with the environmental vision of Japan’s Asahi Group, which it belongs to.

Water. It is one of the most important ingredients of many products – including beer. Not only is it contained in the final product, but also used in the production processes. For that reason, it is so important to reduce its consumption and reclaim it. To brew 1 hl of beer, Kompania Piwowarska needs only 2.63 hl of water. That’s one of the best water consumption results in case of production of beer not only in Poland, but also globally. Kompania Piwowarska’s breweries use local water supply and distribution networks (Poznań and Białystok), while the one in Tychy additionally has its own water intake. What’s important is the fact that their water consumption has no significant impact on the regional resources.

Moreover, Kompania Piwowarska efficiently manages its wastewater, by constantly monitoring its amount and parameters and complying with the rules of treatment prior to reintroducing it to the environment. Reducing the amount of wastewater produced is possible thanks to its partial recovery and reuse, among other things. For example, water from a bottle washer is used to clean empty boxes and there are recovery installations for can rinser water, which is then used for maintenance of transporters.

Carbon footprint. Kompania Piwowarska contributes to execution of the 7th and the 13th SGDs, focusing mainly on reduction of emissions of greenhouse gases. The beer producer monitors its CO2 emissions, and reduces them year after year, currently maintaining a level of 7.07 kg of CO2/hl of beer. The company’s activity in terms of environmental protection resulted in signing a power purchase agreement with wind energy provider, innogy, in November 2019 for 100% renewable electricity from wind farms. Thanks to that, by the end of 2020 Kompania Piwowarska’s breweries in Tychy, Poznań and Białystok will use 40% renewable electricity, while in 2021 it will already be 100%. The result of this change will be 66% reduction of CO2 emissions compared to 2019, and thus Kompania Piwowarska will become one of the first production companies in Poland to use only renewable electricity in its production processes.

The company continues to look for ways to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions. With that in mind, it generates a part of the consumed power itself – by burning natural gas in the Tychy brewery (the energy generated that way constitutes 12.5% of the whole electricity produced by burning fuels in the boiler room).

Kompania Piwowarska’s breweries are equipped with a computer system monitoring consumption of utilities. It allows the company to observe the usage of heating, electricity and cooling in particular time slots. Additionally, the company introduces legal provisions regarding consumption of utilities to the agreements with its subcontractors, the compliance with which is supervised by people responsible for cooperation with particular companies. Many power-reducing solutions were submitted by the employees within the part of the “Kompania of Ideas” programme, and the producer is actively educating its staff within the scope of ecology, by providing practical information on how to save energy.

Waste and recycling. Another specific pro-ecological activity of the company is byproducts and waste management. Kompania Piwowarska keeps improving the process in order to reduce the amounts by means of prevention, reduction, recycling and reuse. In 2019, it recycled almost all byproducts generated by its breweries (over 99%). The producer is also focusing on reusing its packaging – about 49% of Kompania Piwowarska’s products is distributed in reusable packaging: glass bottles and kegs. Last year, the company opened a bottle collection centre by the brewery in Poznań, which was very popular between August 2019 and March 2020 (8 months), and thanks to this initiative about 1 m bottles were returned to the centre. The centre has just been reopened after a break due to COVID-19. If the company had been using disposable bottles, selling the same amount of beer, it would have released 965 m bottles more in 2019, meaning about 315 thousand tons of packaging waste more. At the same time, producing that amount of bottles would mean significantly increased carbon dioxide emissions and consumption of resources necessary to produce glass packaging.

Reduction of water consumption, minimizing CO2 emissions during production, and efficient waste management – these are the specific actions taken by the company to protect the environment. That way, Kompania Piwowarska, the beer industry leader, consistently contributes to minimizing its carbon footprint.