Miller Coors Brewery in Eden, NC

The MillerCoors brewery in Eden has reached an important milestone this past spring in continuing efforts to improve its sustainability practices.

The facility is now a zero waste to landfill brewery, which means employees aren’t sending any trash to the landfill. The brewery recycles of reuses almost 100 percent of all waste and the remaining trash that cannot be recycled, such as various cafeteria waste and floor sweepings, is sent to a waste energy facility in Virginia.

Drew Lucas, the environmental health and safety representative for Eden’s facility, said they have been working to reduce landfill waste over the past several years. From 2007, over half of landfill waste has been reduced and from 2008-2009, a 15-percent reduction in waste going to the landfill was achieved by the brewery.

“Through education, awareness and consistent training at the brewery, we are using specific work instructions and operational practices to put the tools in place for an effective recycling program,” he said. “We see continued savings from reducing waste generation by increasing our recyclables. Eden is one of four major breweries within MillerCoors to have achieved zero waste to landfill.”

Lucas said the transition toward sustainability wasn’t extremely difficult because they have been committed to this effort for a long time. He said they have recently installed a new aluminum bailing system to make it easier for operation and transportation logistics. The oil from the process is sent to a refinery to be reprocessed into new lubricants and fuels.

“We have also installed a new parts washer machine throughout our maintenance shops that are self-recycling and refreshes the cleaner as we need it,” he said. “This eliminates all the waste cleaner from our maintenance shops.”

Through novel ideas from employees and a collective team across the brewery, Lucas said they’ve implemented many programs throughout the facility which all come together to enable a zero waste to landfill business.

“We’ve long believed that waste is simply a resource out of place and through recycling and reuse, we can become more sustainable,” he said. “And it’s not just waste; we’re dedicated to water conservation, energy conservation, and we’re continuously seeking ways to reduce our materials through sustainable packaging methods.”

Lucas said it also helps that Eden has a sustainable partner and leader in the community dedicated to preserving and minimizing the impact to the environment.

The Eden brewery has several other sustainable projects in the works and one that is ready to roll out in the next couple of months. Lucas said the brewery will be installed a new cardboard baler system to further improve recycling cardboard, which is one of the companies major packaging materials.

“We will continue to focus on better recycling and reusing our materials as well as keep focus on our water savings practices,” he said.

MillerCoors has recently released its annual Sustainable Development Report, which can be found at www.greatbeergreatresponsibility.com. The report shows a number of goals in increasing sustainability including reducing water usage by 15 percent by 2015 to achieve a 3.5 to 1.0 water-to-beer ratio. In 2010, the ratio was 4.1 to 1.

Other goals include reducing total energy use by 15 percent by 2015 and removing all packaging throughout the supply chain by 2 percent.