A new brewing kettle has been developed that can significantly reduce CO2 emissions and make beer production more environmentally friendly. The New Belgium Brewing Company, a large brewery in the U.S., currently uses steam to regulate the temperature in its brewing kettles. However, the high demand for heat in other industries, such as chemical separation and sterilization, contributes to around 10% of global CO2 emissions. To address this issue, AtmosZero, a start-up founded by Addison Stark, has developed a modular system for industrial heat production that uses a heat pump technology to collect energy from the surrounding air and produce steam.
The use of electric brewing kettles powered by renewable energy sources such as solar and wind has been an alternative to traditional gas-powered kettles. However, these kettles are typically based on a resistance heating technology that generates heat by passing electric current through a conductive material or directly through the water in the kettle. Due to the high electricity consumption and associated costs, such systems have not been widely adopted. Heat pump systems could be much more efficient than resistance heating-based products, as the majority of the electric current is used to collect and transfer heat rather than directly producing it.
AtmosZero’s technology has not yet been tested in a commercial context, but a six-month pilot project with New Belgium could lead to a commercial business if successful. Despite the potential cost-effectiveness of the technology, it still cannot compete with the extremely low costs of gas-powered kettles in some markets. However, climate policy measures that incentivize the reduction of industrial emissions, such as the EU emissions trading system, could make technologies like AtmosZero’s more attractive.
