Energy Academy
Sector: Breweries/Energy Management in Breweries
Sector17 lessons · 177 min

Energy Management in Breweries

The brewing process and where energy enters it, brewery-specific benchmarks and regulation, and the heat-recovery and refrigeration opportunities unique to a brewhouse — capped with a full brewery energy audit.

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01The Brewing Process & Where Energy Goes

  1. ▶The Brewing Process, Stage by StageFrom milled grain to packaged beer — mashing, lautering, boiling, fermentation and conditioning — and where each stage draws its energy.11 min
  2. ▶Steam & Hot Water Demand in the BrewhouseMashing, sparging and the wort boil are the single biggest thermal load in the building — quantifying it and why the boil dominates.10 min
  3. ▶Refrigeration & Cooling Demand: Wort to CellarWort chilling, fermentation temperature control and cold conditioning — the brewery's other dominant load, this time electrical.10 min
  4. ▶Brewing Fundamentals CheckQuiz on the brewing process and its thermal and refrigeration loads.5 min

02Brewery Energy Use & Benchmarks

  1. ▶Energy Intensity: kWh per HectolitreTypical thermal and electrical intensity benchmarks, why craft breweries run less efficiently than macro-breweries, and the water-energy link.10 min
  2. ▶CIP, Pasteurisation & Packaging-Line EnergyClean-in-place cycles and pasteurisation are hidden hot-water heavyweights; the packaging line's own electrical and compressed-air demand.10 min
  3. ▶Compressed Air & Site UtilitiesWhere compressed air is used in a brewery, and the ancillary loads (pumps, cold stores, lighting) that add up across the site.9 min
  4. ▶Energy Benchmarks CheckQuiz on brewery energy intensity, CIP/packaging and site utilities.5 min

03Regulation & Compliance for Breweries

  1. ▶Trade Effluent Consent & Water ReuseWhy brewery effluent is charged by strength as well as volume, and how heat and water recovery cut both the energy bill and the effluent charge together.10 min
  2. ▶Food Safety Requirements That Set Energy FloorsHACCP-driven CIP temperatures and cold-chain limits aren't negotiable — where safety, not efficiency, sets the minimum.9 min
  3. ▶ESOS, SECR, Climate Change Agreements & Packaging EPRWhich UK schemes actually apply to a brewery your size, the sector's historic Climate Change Agreement, and the rising cost of packaging producer responsibility.10 min
  4. ▶Regulation & Compliance CheckQuiz on trade effluent, food safety limits and applicable UK schemes.5 min

04Efficiency Opportunities in Practice

  1. ▶Heat Recovery in the BrewhouseCapturing the wort boil's vapour and hot-wort heat, and why a brewery's steady, simultaneous steam-and-power demand often suits CHP unusually well.11 min
  2. ▶Refrigeration & Glycol System OptimisationTuning fermentation and conditioning cooling — setpoints, glycol loop design and free cooling — for the cellar's round-the-clock load.10 min
  3. ▶Hands-On: Two Quick DiagnosticsTwo short, real brewery call-outs — a missed heat-recovery opportunity and a glycol system fault — calculate, diagnose and prescribe the fix.12 min
  4. ▶Efficiency in Practice CheckQuiz on brewhouse heat recovery, CHP suitability and refrigeration optimisation.5 min

05Capstone Project

  1. ▶Capstone: Audit a BreweryA full, staged energy audit of a fictional brewery — scope it, walk the site, normalise and baseline its data, and rank the opportunities you find by payback.35 min