E-Malt.com News article: USA, CO: Oskar Blues invests in wastewater system treatment to be able to expand production

One of the stumbling blocks to a major expansion at Oskar Blues Brewery is about to be removed, BlueRidgeNow.com reported on November 2.

The Brevard beer producer is about two weeks away from launching phase one of a brand new, onsite wastewater treatment system that the company expects will take a significant load off the city's overburdened treatment facility.

The ability to treat more wastewater is essential to the company's growth as construction is underway on a new adjoining building in the complex on Mountain Industrial Road that will house several fermentation tanks even larger than the ones packed into the existing 30,000 square-foot warehouse.

The 17,000 square-foot addition will help bump Oskar Blues' annual capacity up to 210,000 barrels in the next two to three years, a number that would rank the Brevard brewery among the 15 largest craft breweries in the U.S.

“We're growing very, very fast,” said Noah Tuttle, general manager of the Oskar Blues Brevard plant.

Tuttle said Oskar Blues is investing $4 million for phases one and two of its new wastewater treatment facility. That includes a 9,000 square-foot expanded wastewater treatment system building and a pair of 24,000 gallon-capacity holding tanks for the brewery's liquid waste.

Oskar Blues spokesman Aaron Baker said phase one will involve an “equalization process,” in which wastewater will be pumped into the two holding tanks and treated to balance pH and temperature and “even the strength” of its wastewater. He added that Oskar Blues had been sending “one big mass of waste all at once,” thus overwhelming the city treatment system.

“They had challenges handling what we were sending them,” Baker said, “so (phase one) goes a long way toward equalling out what we're sending, and allows the city to better handle it.”

Tom Williams, lab manager of the city's wastewater treatment plant, said the cleaning chemicals used by Oskar Blues cause the brewery's wastewater to be either very acidic, with a pH less than 6, or very caustic, with a pH greater than 9, which at times impacted the city's wastewater plant.

“By neutralizing the pH between 6 and 9,” Williams said, “there is less impact on the sewer pipes from corrosion and on the plant's ability to treat the wastewater. (Oskar Blues') equalization basins will help control their flow, preventing accidental discharges and 'slug' loads of high BOD (biochemical oxygen demand) that impact the ability of the (city's) wastewater treatment plant to treat the wastewater effectively.”

Brevard City Manager Jim Fatland added that Oskar Blues' new treatment facility will allow the brewery to discharge to the city wastewater plant at “optimum times to do treatment,” namely during daytime hours when overall concentrations of wastewater aren't so high, “which will make it so much easier for us to handle at our facility.”

Fatland said that through phase one of the project, Oskar Blues is working toward fulfilling city requirements for pre-treatment of wastewater, while also helping the city meet standards for its own permit with the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources.

”The city is very pleased with the progress they're making on phase one,” Fatland said.

Tuttle said Oskar Blues will be monitoring its new facility's success to get a better picture of phase one before determining exactly what phase two — which is expected to be implemented by the end of 2016 — will look like.

In the meantime, “Phase one will be hugely beneficial for them, and us,” Tuttle said. “The city needs upgrades on their system, and we needed upgrades on what we were sending them, so between the two upgrades, I think we'll be in a good place.”

The wastewater treatment facility isn't the only improvement or addition taking place at the brewery.

Oskar Blues recently installed a second 50-barrel mash tun — the vessel that helps convert starches in the malted barley to fermentable sugars, resulting in the hot, sweet liquid known as wort.

That will facilitate the increased production once Oskar Blues begins utilizing the 6 to 8 new 300-barrel fermentation tanks it expects to receive in 2016. Oskar Blues just announced the addition of two more states, Mississippi and Utah, to its distribution footprint, and by next spring expects to have all 50 states covered, with the Brevard plant serving nearly 30 of them — mostly in the eastern half of the country — in addition to three countries in Europe.

“The East Coast is booming,” Baker said of the craft-beer market. “We're getting a lot of beer orders.”

Oskar Blues estimates production for 2015 in Brevard alone will be about 80,000 to 85,000 barrels. Once that number reaches 200,000 and beyond in a couple of years, Tuttle said, employment will likely nearly double from the 47 current workers to about 80.

Meanwhile, Oskar Blues also is about to receive two new huge grain silos, each with a capacity of 80,000 pounds.

A new spent-grain silo was installed this summer that allows the large daily amount of barley husks to be hauled off-site and delivered to local farmers for cattle feed. Baker said the brewery worked with the city to allow the painting of the silo to look like a massive Oskar Blues beer can soaring into the sky.

In addition, Oskar Blues recently installed a new 14-goot-tall hops cooler, an energy-efficient lighting system throughout the plant that will also help reduce mold, and an automated case palletizer like the one at its brewery in Longmont, Colo., which alleviates the previously backbreaking labor for its employees on the packaging line.

“That was a huge investment for us,” Tuttle said, “not in terms of financial return but in terms of the well-being of our team.”


04 November, 2015