[...]Beer and Climate Change « Beer Activist[...]…

[...]Beer and Climate Change « Beer Activist[...]…

Cheers,
Chris

Do you have the statistics on the differences in the emissions between glass and aluminum during their recycling processes? Which creates more pollution versus the % of recycling capabilities? That would be interesting to know.

Aaron

Got your book in the post from Amazon today. Looking forward to an interesting read.

D

According to studies I cite in my book Fermenting Revolution, recycling an aluminum can takes 95% less energy than is required to produce one from scratch, whereas glass recycling takes only 25% less energy than producing a new glass bottle. Cans have an average of 55% recycled content but glass bottles only contain an average of 23%. Add in the reduced impact from lighter and better shaped cans, and combine that with the efficiency of aluminum recycling, high aluminum recycling rates and high recycled content average, and one begins to understand why aluminum is more energy efficient than glass even though the production process is more energy intensive. So, really we need to recycle more glass and use it more in bottle manufacture. But the game changer here is getting rid of packaging altogether – brew at home, drink draft, or drink at a brewpub!

Cheers,
Chris

that claim an aluminium can has between 9 and 14 time the embodied energy of a bottle. This only takes the manufacturing process into account, not the recycling lifecycle. This would seem to counter the move to cans being suggested in this article. Any further detail on the recycling lifecycle that accounts for the much higher energy required to make single use bottles vs. cans?