USA, RI: Iron Stag Brewing delays opening to next summer

Cranston's newest nanobrewery, Iron Stag Brewing, was supposed to open this summer, turning the side of its building on Rolfe Square into a patio and hangout space, The Providence Journal reported on December 4.

Steel beams outlined future rooms. Inside, there was a Frankenstein-style brewing system with parts sourced from across the Northeast. There were even taps and steel girders and a space for brewing beer.

But that opening has been delayed to at least next summer by an old problem that only recently has come to the forefront among the small breweries and brewpubs that have started to proliferate across the state: wastewater. Cranston's wastewater-treatment department wants Iron Stag Brewing to clean its wastewater before it hits the drains.

Each barrel of beer (about 31 gallons) produces about seven barrels of wastewater, according to the Brewers Association. After evaporation, about 70% of that wastewater is left. For years, that wastewater went straight to the sewage treatment system, but the byproducts of beer are both acidic and filled with far more nutrients than residential wastewater.

"Some of the remediations required are pretty costly," said A.J. Kilroy, the brewery's president.

To get the wastewater to the right pH, the first quote Kilroy received was $80,000 – and that did not include getting rid of the solids left after the brewing is done, like the yeast and sediments.

A full system to treat the wastewater was quoted at $250,000, overkill for the few barrels of wastewater the nanobrewery expects to produce.

"That's as much as we're putting into our buildout and the existing equipment we have," Kilroy said.

An engineer by trade, Kilroy designed a system himself with parts purchased off the shelf, but he still needed to get a sign-off from an engineer who specializes in wastewater. After working with a consulting company, Kilroy was pointed in a brand new direction: trucking the waste off-site.

The consultants at Weston & Sampson directed Kilroy to the anaerobic digester in Johnston, a facility that uses an oxygen-free environment to turn organic waste into gas, which is then burned to generate electricity and a sludge of what is essentially compost.

The Johnston facility, which has changed ownership multiple times, fully opened in 2018, EcoRI News reported.

The brewery will install a 2,000-gallon tank and some pumps and have it picked up once a week to be turned into renewable energy.

"That digester is a really big development for any small brewer," he said.

After solving the wastewater problem, the city's fire marshal had concerns about the brewing system's burners, which would have run on a natural gas line. The brewers decided to pivot and ordered an all-electric brewing system that increases their capacity to four barrels per brew, two more than the original system.

"That's putting us further ahead in production, and we're going to need it," Kilroy said.

The gas burners will soon be listed for sale on ProBrewer, a website for professional brewers.

While they will keep some of the tanks scrounged from across the Northeast, the new system will make it look a lot more like a professional brewery and a lot less like a homebrewer's setup.

"It's kind of like climbing a mountain, and then realizing you have to climb another," Kilroy said. "We've been trying to get going for four years, and we're still pushing forward. It's been expensive but it's been worth it."

With the fire marshal's concerns alleviated, the order being put in for the electric brewing system and the trucking solution to the wastewater problem, Kilroy said he is feeling a lot better about the brewery, if still a little anxious.

"Time is literally money in this space, but we have so much support and partnerships," he said.

The contractor doing the buildout inside the brewery has become part owner, exchanging his work for equity in the brewery because he believes it has so much potential.

Brewing could begin as early as March, and opening day will be no later than the Fourth of July.

"The community support we've been getting, the number of people who've reached out, it's been tremendous, and we can't wait to give them what they're going for," Kilroy said.

Besides opening by the summer, the nanobrewery is hoping to eventually expand the operation from four barrels to a seven-to-ten barrel system. At that price point and volume, the $250,000 price tag for a wastewater treatment system is a lot easier to handle, he said.

05 December, 2023